


Babes in the Woods

by InterNutter



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Amnesty Arc, Babysitting, Balance Arc, Crossover, Fountain of Youth, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Stolen Century
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-26
Updated: 2018-04-30
Packaged: 2019-04-08 14:41:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 36
Words: 36,715
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14107581
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InterNutter/pseuds/InterNutter
Summary: The Pine Guard are almost used to dealing with Abominations, by now. But this one isn't acting like your average bom-bom. Older people are going missing, and there's a sudden influx of children turning up lost.And there's something... else... with glowing eyes in the night...





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: The Adventure Zone in general, the Amnesty Arc, the Balance Arc, and the Stolen Century belong to the McElroys. This is just mad musings on my part.
> 
> AN: Because Griffin didn’t do it, I fucking gave the rabbit magical powers. Nerny nerny ner ner. Also, I fucking love the idea that Elves in TAZ:BA habitually refer to humans as ‘humanman’ because it’s pretty much Taako that always fucking does it.

Emergency Service People believe that all the weird stuff comes out during the full moon. Statistics has shown that this is confirmation bias. The weird ones are evenly spread throughout the month, and the only peaks are those noticed by the workers on the scene. There is only one place on the planet where Statistics would agree with Superstition.

Kepler.

There, the full moon is… a harbinger. A warning. And that, in combination with the strange light seen over the Monongahela National Park, meant that Duck “it’s a nickname” Newton was patrolling the forest paths and game trails. And since there was a bad moon on the rise, he went out with his most annoying partner. Beacon.

“I am glad to finally be included in your duties, DucK,” said the whipsword, clicking the last consonants of his nickname, as was its wont.

“I’d appreciate it if you expressed yourself a little more quietly,” murmured Duck. “This is what you might call a stealth mission. Difficult to do when y’all are up in there shooting your mouth off.”

“DUCK NEWTON!”

“Gosh  _ dangit, _ Minerva! Just scare off everything in the gosh-dang woods, next time.”

“INNOCENTS ARE IN PERIL, DUCK NEWTON. YOU MUST BEWARE THE LIGHT MERGED WITH THE DAR--” The pale blue image of a woman flickered out.

“Aw pucknuckles,” grumbled Duck.

“I take it that this is no longer a case for stealth, DucK.”

“You shut your dang word hole.”

And then she flickered back in. “--VER MEANT TO MIX, DU--” flicker. “--LSO, SEEK THE STRA--” flicker. “--LVER SHIP. THEY WI--” flicker.

The silence stretched out. Duck reached for the  _ other _ walkie-talkie. The one with the rainbow of glow-in-the-dark tape (Lady Flame’s idea) and flicked it on. “Y’all, I just had a warning encounter. Connection’s getting spottier with time. Minerva needs t’ check her dang batteries.”

“Anything of important portent, Duck?” asked Ned. “Some useful clue we can use to gird our armour with, perhaps?”

“She was flickerin’ in and out on me, there, Ned. I got light merged with dark, ‘strange’ and somethin’ silver. That’s it.”

“I do believe that we have won more with less,” allowed Ned, “but I cannot recall the time nor the place.”

“Lady Flame, you get all of that?”

Silence.

“Lady Flame, come back.”

Finally, her voice came over the link. “Sorry. Sorry.” She was out of breath. “I was… uh… pre-occupied.”

“Now listen,” said Duck. “I’m pleased as punch that y’all are fresh in the bloom of young love an’ all, but you’re supposed to be  _ on call _ durin’ the full moon.”

“And not,” suggested Ned, “answering the call of the wild… heheheheh…”

“Euw gross. I do  _ not _ want a sixty-year-old man commenting on my love life.”

“I am not sixty years old,” said Ned. “I happen to be in the prime of my life.”

“...in ancient Egypt,” said Aubrey. “Because that’s how hard you’re in denial.”

“Was that a pun?” said Beacon. “If it is, then it sphynx.”

“Awright, let’s cut the cackle,” said Duck. “You all gather what intel you can and meet me up at the Lodge come the dawn. Let’s try to get lead on this mother ducker.”

“You curse like a five-year-old,” said Aubrey.

“That’s a lie,” said Ned. “I’ve known some foul-mouthed little shits who can cuss the air blue at  _ four.” _

“Work first, y’all. Argue later.” Duck signed off. And then his work radio sputtered into life.

“Uh, Duck? We have an incident at campground fifteen? Lost child.”

Right. His  _ paying _ job. “Be right there,” he said, and took the whipsword off of its perch on his shoulder. “I wish I could say I’m sorry about this, but… I’m still getting over just outright hating you.”

The mouth of the whipsword grinned. “Thank you for being honest with your feelings, DucK. With this step forward we will make a mighty team and vanqui--”

And Duck crammed the thing into the Pouch. It was a Silvan holding bag. The size and appearance of a regular old fanny pack, one worn and bashed around a bit. But it could hold -and silence- an astonishing amount of things. And, because Silvan magics were awesome, it would put into his hand anything in there that he was looking for.

Non-magical or unknowing eyes would see its contents as anything one might expect from a Ranger’s fanny pack.

Duck took off at a ground-eating trot for campground fifteen. Lost kids had priority.


	2. Chapter 2

She woke with the sun in her eyes. On the hard ground. In the middle of a forest. In a pool of clothing that was way too big for her. There were other concerns, like the overnight transformation of something very important and very personal to herself… but no memory of how it happened. She reached out her left hand without looking and jostled her brother.

Who was also lying on the hard ground. In a pool of clothing. “Wh’d’h’k?” he mumbled.

“Exactly,” she said. “Look.” And she stood up out of the clothes. Naked, because none of the clothes fit her.

“Y’r Lulu,” mumbled her brother. “So?”

Koko was not a morning person. Ever. She sighed at his obliviousness, said,  _ “Look.” _ And pointed to her junk. Which was proper, real, girl’s junk and not the junk she was steadily growing to hate right up until this morning.

Koko blinked. “Okay. Wow. Neat.” His brain started operating at last. “Guess this saves us a thousand GP worth of gems, huh?”

Lulu giggled. In spite of everything that was weird about this, she had to love how cool her brother was with the most important change in her world. “Okay Koko. You’re still half asleep. But to give you a brief summary, babe… Everything be mucked up.”

Koko squinted at their surroundings. “Where da heck our house go?”

“Yeah. Look at the sky, now.”

He rubbed his eyes first. “...’s too early,” he whined. Squinched his eyes tight before he blinked open his eyes. Blearily looked up.

Lulu started counting backwards. Five. Four. Three. Two…

“HOLY TITS IT’S BLUE! HOW’D THE SKY TURN BLUE?”

Lulu sat on top of the clothing puddle. “Everything be mucked up, bro-bro.”

His hair frizzed right up. “Why… this?”

Lulu took up the big, heavy coat and draped it around them both. For warmth. For reassurance. For something to help her brother calm the heck down. “It doesn’t really matter. It really doesn’t. We can’t change anything by finding out why it is. It just is.”

“Maybe someone got through Mama’s wards and cast Banish on us. The sky could be different in another plane. Right?”

Lulu sighed. “Okay. You explained it. Well done. We’re still in the middle of nowhere with no clothes, no food, and no family. Now what?”

“Now we remember everything Uncle Ench taught us and use everything we got.”

The robes and stuff were huge. Grown-up size. But they didn’t belong to Mama. Because the leather hair ties in the pockets all had golden hairs caught in them. And the really weird part that made Lulu’s brain hurt was the fact that the clothing was  _ in place. _ Underwear on the inside, as if whoever had been wearing them turned into smoke on the spot.

Or… maybe shrank down to the size of six-year-olds?

Together, the twins figured out how to turn the big coats into baskets for everything else. The shirts on the insides of the big, red robes made decent dresses for the both of them. Lulu could tell that they were high quality, and felt a pang of regret at making new holes in the neck so that they could lace them up tighter and not have the shirts threaten to fall off of their thin shoulders.

Koko grinned at the silk underwear. At the lace that fancied it up to a degree that neither of them had witnessed in person. At the gold trim to these fancy-ass clothes.

“I think we grew up,” said Lulu. “We must have scammed this fancy stuff from someone somehow.”

“I. P. R. E,” Koko read from the patch on the robe. “Fancy  _ and _ schmancy. I like it. And look. Names are on ‘em.”

Lulu’s middle rumbled. “Let’s focus on food, first. Okay?”

“Clean water, then food, then shelter,” said Koko. “That’s what Uncle Ench said.”

“And find us some Hazel twigs,” added Lulu.

Koko dug something out of a robe pocket. “No need.” It was a starter wand. A fancy-ass starter wand. Simple enough to be truly expensive make. “We got these.”

Lulu dug around in hers. Almost exactly the same as his. “Shit yeah,” she cooed. And then they giggled at the swears.

There were no adults to stop them.

Hand in hand, new bindles over their shoulders, they set out into the wilderness.


	3. Chapter 3

The lost child was actually a found child. A little old lady in campsite fifteen had heard crying in the night and found a little girl, not a day over five, in a Hooter’s wife beater that was way too large for her.  She’d compromised by tying knots in the garment, which still trailed around her skinny ankles. If she stood.

She was currently huddled up on the winnebagos front step and hugging a plush dressing gown around her shoulders. She looked scared.

The little old lady, Simova, tottered over to Duck as fast as she could toddle. “A word, please, sir?”

Duck stopped where he was, and nodded. “Somethin’s up.”

Simova gestured his ear to her mouth. “The poor little thing doesn’t have underpants. She won’t talk to anyone. I tried giving her some cookies, but she says she doesn’t want to get fat. That’s all she ever said.”

So. Bribing her with the usual lollipops would not work. “Any other little warning signs?”

“She ain’t got a mark on her, but… I swear she acts like she’s been in a bad place. She flinches at shadows and don’t want a doctor.”

“Right. I’ll take it real gentle like.” It wasn’t often that Duck shook out his Chosen One Charm, but this occasion called for it. Winning smile. I’m-harmless-I-promise walk. Friendly and careful. Cheerful. Glad to see this poor little whelp who looked scared of the world. “Howdy, there, li’l miss. I’m District Ranger Duck Newton. It’s a nickname.” He stopped approaching her when she scrunched up a little. Hunkered down so that he was less threatening.

Dark eyes stared at him. Tearful and fearful.

“No need t’ be afraid, li’l miss. I’m a park ranger. And the one thing about park rangers is that we’re super prepared for any forest emergency. And since you’re scared I’m willin’ to declare that an emergency if you are. Do you feel like you’re in an emergency, ma’am?”

She nodded.

“Well, now I’m equipped to help y’all out. You name it, I prob’ly got it in this here pouch. Try me.”

She looked around herself. Checking for dangerous people. Said, “C’n I have s’m clean underwear?”

The Silvan pouch delivered. White and plain, and sealed in a vacuum baggie. Bearing the Monongahela logo. “Can I come on over and hand this to you?”

She nodded.

Duck did not get up from his crouch, but waddled over in a crouching position. Which made her laugh. Once you got scared little kids to laugh? The battle was halfway over. “See? More’n one reason why they call me Duck.”

Simova spoke up. “You can change in my water closet, dearie. It’s okay. You won’t get in any trouble, I promise.”

“Mrs Simova and I are gonna have a nice little campfire chat,” reassured Duck. “No doors will be locked that you don’t choose to lock. Okay?”

Nod.

He waited until she was inside to rise and go sit with Simova on her folding chairs. All nice and companionable. “Mrs Simova? This here is what I like to call a level five clusterfluff. I can investigate to a limited degree, but we are going to have to get Child Services in on this. Hopefully without scaring the little one. Now I happen to know a very safe housing facility nearby. Since it’s summer, our little friend can stay up there without much of a bother. Got some very companionable folks up in there.”

“That does sound nice,” Simova allowed.

“But before I get into all of that, we need to get some words out of our little friend.”

And that was going to take some time.


	4. Chapter 4

This was a good forest. Loads of forage. And this particular place had a hillside by a stream with a small cavern in it that was almost the exact dimensions of their cote at home. Only with a roof, instead of the protective sides that helped them rest and let Mama get immediate access to them. And everything but the boots made that cote comfortable and cosy.

The stream water was fresh and clear and clean and cold, and it was only a few minutes away from their cote cave. Just like their campfire was going to be. They had no tools but sticks and rocks, but that was okay. Even the basic idea of breaking a rock to get a sharp edge would make something of a tool they could use.

Koko had something better than a dumb old sharp rock. Some fool had broken a glass bottle and left the big shards just lying around! It was easy to make some edges safe with clay and others sharper with a little judicious tapping.

Whoever Pepsi was, they were rich enough to just throw away glass like that, and stupid enough to actually do it.

The fish were fat and plentiful. Lulu helped him dig a pit and bury the guts under one of the trees that they were using for wood.

There were bears in these woods. The twins could smell them.

And just like Uncle Ench said, they only had a campfire for as long as it took to cook. Wild food had all sorts of things in it, so they had to cook thoroughly. Even with rough herbs and random vegetation, Koko was rather proud of it. Though he wished he had a cauldron to make some tea or something. Though for some weird reason everything he drank tasted like key lime gogurt.

Why anyone would want their mouth to do that was currently beyond him. But it must have happened when he was a grownup. The same mechanic must have worked on his sister as well. Permanent changes remained, despite the chronology.

He could deal with key lime gogurt for every drink if it meant that his sister was happy.

What they really needed, he decided, was salt. If they could get their hands on salt, everything would taste a million times better. But forest herbs would do.

At least they did until they smelled something else on the prevailing winds. Grilling steak. And onions. And other meats.

Koko nudged Lulu. “Tell me you smell what I smell.”

Lulu inhaled. “Mmmmm… pork. Someone’s having a party.” She grinned. “Let’s crash it!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Medieval versus modern:
> 
> * There was no industrial farming and pork took a year to grow, so it was pretty much festival food  
> * Salt was difficult to get and expensive in many places. I know you're saying "Seaside towns" as an objection to this, but also remember that there were almost no sewer systems in Europe until the Steam Era, so anything from the shoreline was (a) foul and (b) toxic  
> * Glass was also precious and difficult to manufacture. Today's clear glass was usually reserved for the rich, and glazed windows were made out of small panels because that's where glass-blowing was for a majority of the middle ages
> 
> Isn't learning history fun?


	5. Chapter 5

Kirby examined the footage from Ned’s full moon prowl. “I told you that body cam was a good investment.” The four glowing lights in the darkness blinked in unison. Two amber lights bracketed by green ones.

Ned’s recorded voice said, “Heeeere, critter, critter, critter?”

Kirby glared at him. “Yeah. We’re gonna have to cut out the audio.”

Ned’s recording made kissy noises. “Puss puss?”

“Really?” accused Kirby.

“It could have been two cats,” allowed Ned. “That’s where the miracle of editing makes my work a joy to behold for the foil hat crowd everywhere.”

“Well, it’s a good thing you never figured out the night vision. There’s no telling what this thing is.” Now Kirby grinned. “Which means we have ourselves a Kepler-exclusive cryptid.”

Ned hummed five notes. Crooned, “We’re in the money…”

“In-deedly-doodly, neighbourino.”

Ned chuckled. “Now. What to call it. The Kepler Whatizzit? The wide beast?”

“Old Four-Eyes?” suggested Kirby.

“It’s fairly short to the ground,” allowed Ned. “The Pugwanchinah? Make it sound like an ancient First Nation cryptid?”

“Oooh… yeah. They eat that shit up,” muttered Kirby, already typing an article. He, too, began humming the five notes. “P-U-G-W-A-N or P-U-G-W-O-N?”

“W-A-N sounds more authentic, my friend.”

“Nuthin’ like genuine fake authenticity…”

Dingdingdingdingding. “Hey, hello?”

Ned turned around and instantly turned on his Bafflegab. “Greetings, friends and seekers of the truth. Welcome to the Cryptonomica. The only museum in West Virginia -nay, the entire nation- where the mysteries are real and the seekers know the truth. We even have certain authentic relics of the strange, mysterious, and the bizarre can be purchased by true believers. For the right price.”

The family who entered were looking shellshocked. “Do y’all  _ buy _ footage? If it’s good?”

Ned looked to Kirby and winked. If anyone knew how to copy footage while it was being viewed, it was this lad. “We’d have to review it first, of course.”

Kirby winked back, switching out apps on his laptop. “Let’s put it all up on the display screen so we can all see.”

There was some necessary futzing with cables and whatnot, and all eyes were on the big screen whilst Kirby gained a free copy.

It seemed like a regular party. The mother was watching li’l Jefry to make sure he wasn’t snatching more than his fair share of bratwurst off of his Daddy’s grille. It was a usual summer cook-out. Wired kids in a melee around the picnic and a lot of shrieking and babble. Brown and reddish-brown and… suddenly a pair of golden-haired kids in the scrum.

“They ain’t our’n,” said the mother, pointing them out. “And they ain’t from this world.”

They had pointed ears. Eyes larger than a regular kid’s. Darker skin that was dappled like a fawn in shades of pale pink, dark brown, and a peculiar golden sheen.

Ned felt chills.

“They look like Anna and Elsa,” said the youngest girl, who had them on her shirt. “Only prettier.”

The recorded mother finally noticed and focussed on one of them. These creatures had odd eyes. One green. One amber. Vertical slits as pupils. These creatures had pointed ears that  _ moved. _

“What the shit?” said the recording.

The golden-haired twins fled. Quicker than most could follow. Each with a handful of purloined food. Into the woods. The recording followed them, but could not find a trace.

“Eighty dollars for an exclusive copy,” said Ned. “Make it an even two hundred if you and yours are willing to testify for my esteemed film technician and co-manager, Kirby.”

Who whistled backwards. “Yeah. That’s top-ticket stuff, believe me.”

“Do y’all know what they are?”

Ned took her hand and did what he did best. Bullshit at warp nine. “My dear lady. You and yours have been honoured by a visit from Pugwanchinah. Ancient woodland spirits, said to be born from the forest and the sun. Legends say that in the ancient times, the sky was much closer to the land, and the embodiments of the forces of nature walked in the forms of mankind…”

Kirby subtly turned on his own recording devices. He would be better at remembering all of this crap would be easier if he had a recording of the original bafflegab.


	6. Chapter 6

There was something odd about the Humanman food. Something that turned their brains into fireworks and made them extra giggly. Sure, the stuff tasted fantastic, but it got them lost and wounded by assorted thorns and rough rocks before they came back to themselves with aching heads and aching bodies.

“Ow,” whined Koko. “Did we steal salt?”

Lulu checked her hands. “Nope.” She too groaned. “We shouldn’t steal their food again. There’s something wrong with it.”

Very carefully, Koko checked the orientation of the sun. “Do you think we can find the cote again?”

“I can smell our old campfire. That way. We can find it from there.”

The world was painful, so they picked a careful path along the way that Lulu smelled. It didn’t take them very long, and the wild nuts and berries they found along the way helped their aching heads a little bit. As did a few dandelion leaves to chew.

There was a humanman by their old campfire when they got close. Both twins instantly hunkered in the underbrush. He was dressed in some kind of uniform. Raising a device to his face just like the lady at the party. Making flashes of light at their extinguished campsite.

_ This _ was why Uncle Ench said never to camp in the same place twice, and always camp away from the safe place to rest.

He spoke into something attached to his chest. “Watch House three, I found the fire you spotted this mornin’. Looks like someone’s been poaching.”

“Liar,” hissed Koko. “It was open roasted.”

“Ssh,” cautioned Lulu.

They watched in silence. Perfectly still, as the humanman wandered around for a little bit. Made some more flashes at things he found, and then wandered off again. “No sign of further hazard. I reckon they moved on.”

Lulu and Koko were still extremely cautious as they crept around to their cote. And, more importantly, to the stream of sweet, clean water so they could drink away the awful after-effects of humanman food.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mediaeval versus Modern:
> 
> Sugar as we know it is something from the Tudor times, almost the modern era. Before then, it was fruit and honey to sweeten things. Of course Elves are not used to processed sugar, nor the additives modern humans stick into packaged food, so our babies are paying for stealing some of those snackie cakes and sugar bars from that barbecue.
> 
> They'll sleep it off. Don't fret.
> 
> [And yes, that is Duck examining the campfire]


	7. Chapter 7

There was a big table in the Lodge with a map of Monongahela in its surface. Aubrey was collating data. “So. We’ve had five found children just last night,” little white pawns at their locations, and one green one “Including one Suzie Francis, who Duck interviewed. Also… five campers have gone missing in the woods.” Red counters. And one brown one. “Including one Suzan Oberman. Nee Francis.” She looked up at the assembled Pine Tree Guard. “I don’t think this could be a co-incidence. Last night, Ned spotted some eyes in the night.” A different part of the map. A tiny plastic knight figurine in blue. “And this morning, a pack of campers recorded some interesting footage of -well- aliens, I guess.” This marker was close to the first one. Another plastic knight in orange. “And Duck found a very professional campground from some poachers who only took what they ate.” A third knight in green. “I don’t think this is a co-incidence either.”

Ned dialled up a still on his phone. Muttering the instructions Kirby had given him as he did so. “I don’t know what they are? But ‘aliens’ would do, I suppose.”

Aubrey looked. It was amazing that a picture like that wasn’t all over the news. “That is super not human.”

Dani, looking over Aubrey’s shoulder, whistled. “That ain’t one from my side…”

Ned looked at Duck. And grinned. “We got some real live actual fucking aliens in Kepler! This is going to be a tourist mecca!”

Duck, as ever, remained Mister Unflappable. “Don’t reckon they’d be doin’ that much. They look like kids. Reckon stealing food’s a good sign they don’t know how to get their own.”

“You’d need Henson levels of genius and fucking Elon Musk levels of money to try to fake that,” Aubrey, far more technical, had taken Ned’s phone and was watching his copy of the footage. “Wow. Did the people who took this get an explanation?”

“Of course they did, Aubrey,” said Ned. “I gave them an excellent exposition in regards to the ancient legend of Pugwanchinah, the twin forest spirits of Monongahela. Born of the sun and the forest. In ancient times--”

“So you sold them a line of bullshit,” Aubrey interrupted. “Okay. I’ll catch up on it when Kirby publishes the next  _ Lamplighter. _ Fine. The real question is… are they our Bombom?”

Now it was Duck’s turn to look at it all. “No. I don’t reckon they are. See, your average Abomination is out to kill, eat, and get strong. These here critters just snuck in to someone’s cook-out and filched a bunch of food. That ain’t typical abomination behaviour.”

Doctor Harris Bonkers (PhD) had been nibbling Timothy Hay at his post in a corner of the table. He washed his face with his paws because he  _ was _ a giant rabbit. A New Zealand White, to be precise. And then he said, “These beings you’ve found are behaving like prey. And I believe Mom has already deduced that the children are victims of the Bombom.”

Of all the weird shit that happened in Kepler on the daily, the magical cross-wiring that gave Doctor Harris Bonkers the capability of speech was one of the weirder ones. On one hand, it did kill the Abomination that they were after. On the other hand, the fact that he insisted on calling his handler ‘Mom’ was often a sticking point with people.

Duck would very occasionally mutter that too many things around Kepler that shouldn’t talk, did.

“Thank you, Doctor Bonkers,” said Aubrey. “Do you think the wood-waifs would--”

“Pugwanchinah,” corrected Ned.

Aubrey glared at him. “I’m not going to dignify your butchered attempt at a First Nations’ word. As I was saying. Doctor Bonkers. Do you think these wood-waifs would be a danger?”

And since he  _ was _ a rabbit, he had a finely-tuned sense of danger. “They’re children,” he said in what would later be recognised as a classic case of underestimation. “The most they could do is hug me and pull my ears.”


	8. Chapter 8

A Captain stayed with the ship. That much was plain and simple. Lucretia was out with Barry and Merle, and Magnus was keeping watch on the prow. As if his human eyes could see anything better by moonlight.

Davenport finished checking up on the ship, made sure his illusions would survive, and ventured into the kitchen now that the twins weren’t anywhere near it. As far as the twins were concerned, his cooking was a crime against nature. The Elves in general and Taako in particular would rather eat his steering rather than his attempt at frying.

And after a few worlds without them, Davenport could agree. Things were a lot less flavourful without the twins. And though Merle’s scrying said they were alive, something must have happened to prevent them from coming back. And superstition alone made Davenport believe that setting foot in Taako’s kitchen would make the Elf appear to chew him out for doing so.

He got down the “essential equipment” for making hot chocolate, and felt a pang of sorrow when no golden-haired Elves spontaneously appeared to stop him from doing that. Then he got out the manual marked, “In the event of Elf death”, and skipped over the first, illuminated page that read,  _ We had better be fucking dead or you’re gonna hear about this for five worlds, minimum. _

He checked the index of Recipes That Even Barold Can’t Fuck Up for the Beverages section and looked up the Hot Chocolate.

The recipes were so thorough that they contained step-by-step instructions for boiling water. Replete with steps like,  _ Do not wander off to solve some twelve dimensional math problem - BAROLD. _

Davenport sighed. At least he could be relied upon to boil water without fucking it up. But then again, he had spent most of his life living on augmented fantasy ramen. Lup and Taako alike had ragged him endlessly about  _ only _ knowing how to add boiling water to stuff.

Lucretia had been devoted to making this manual ever since the Twins fell desperately ill on Allergen World and the combined crews’ disabilities in the kitchen had been a stark contrast against the twins’ gourmet fare.

Davenport finished making a hot chocolate according to instructions for Magnus, including the preferred colour of marshmallow, and then joined their security chief on the deck. Handing the steaming mug over. “They’re still alive,” he said. “They may be detained. They may have been captured. But they’re  _ alive.” _

Magnus accepted the cup and sipped, still staring out at the darkness. “Almost as good as Taako makes it,” he said. “Pretty good, Cap’n’port.”

“We’re out of Cinnamon Sugar,” he said. “I couldn’t dust it according to instructions.”

“Any luck with local transmissions?”

“Only a very few. And they’re faint. Not the best for intelligence. This particular area is a silent zone. They have places listening to the universe, so they can’t have local interference.”

“Listening to the universe,” cooed Magnus. “Wow. That’s pretty cool.”

“Not bad for a techworld. It’s weird. When they don’t have other species, they want them. When they do…” he shrugged.

“Yeah. Humans are weird,” agreed Magnus the human.

A magical flare went up. Trouble.

“Captain?” Magnus handed back the mug. “Permission to disembark?”

“Make sure you have what you need, first. Be prepared.  _ Then, _ permission granted.”

Magnus rushed off.

Davenport retreated to the bridge. Placed Magnus’ mug under a cover charmed to keep it frozen in time. In an hour, in a year, it would still be just as fresh as when he left it. Davenport began to pray that it would be an hour, and not a year.

In the space of that particular night, he would be praying for something else.


	9. Chapter 9

Someone had killed one of Monongahela’s deer. They had done it quietly, cleanly, and efficiently. They had then butchered the deer, leaving the skin, bone, and inedible innards all buried in a neat parcel that a bear had then dug up and scattered around.

There was no blood trail.

But there was evidence of what they’d used.

Someone had turned a shattered bottle into tools. One of them had broken, and Duck could see how the mystery poacher had shaped an edge onto the broken glass and then used resin and primitive twine to attach it to a handle.

They had also taken the head, and the long bones. Full of rich contents like marrow and brains. Just the sort of thing someone who was into survivalism would take. Duck got onto his radio. “Watch House three. Watch House five? Be on the look-out for any trace of fire in or near the previous locale. I do believe we got us a survival nut in the park.”

Watch House three said, “Aw she-it. I hate those nutbars. Roger that, Duck.”

Lady Flame, who knew as much about woodland survival as any millennial in the wilderness, was within eyesight of Duck and trying some elementary divination with a crystal pendant. Her familiar, Doctor Harris Bonkers, was in a Baby Bjorn on her back. Lady Flame was in the process of making the thing match her aesthetic, and one of the pocket zippers now had a skeleton keychain dangling off of it.

Duck preferred to use his tracking skills. There were some footprints and butt-prints in the dirt near the impression left by the deer carcass. Small poachers. Maybe… and he hated to think this, Pugwanchinah-sized.

Weird for little kids to know about hunting, butchering, and preparing their own meat.

Maybe… they weren’t little kids…

“Sensin’ any danger, there, Doctor Bonkers?”

“All the predators are far away,” announced the rabbit. “But if you have a spare moment, could you pass up some of that dandelion, please? I am a little bit peckish.”

“Focus, Doctor Bonkers,” said Lady Flame. “Focus on the lost wood-waifs. Feel their energies flowing towards us through the fibres of the aether.”

Duck sighed, even as he passed up the dandelions. It was such a pity that Lady Flame’s magic depended to a certain degree on her stage patter. And it was an even bigger pity that nobody could tell where the true magic ended and the pure horse-puckies began.

“Find them,” said Lady flame, and a spark of fire lit off of the pendant and became an actual will-o-the-wisp. Not like the ones off of Pixar, but a little ball of blue fire that hung in the air. It circled the slaughter-site once, and then began weaving through the trees.

Duck began to hope that it wouldn’t light any part of the forest on fire. He’d never hear the end of it if it did.


	10. Chapter 10

The water was cold, which was good for storage. And, to a certain extent, washing. Lulu and Koko took turns diving down with their wrapped cache parcels, and burying them under stones at the bottom of the still part of the river. They had their shirts drying on branches and one would sun themselves on the rocks while the other dove down with their haul.

Enough venison for weeks!

If they were stuck here for the winter, they were set. And if not -well- nature would eventually make sure nothing was wasted.

“I think we should steal one of their portable fire pits,” said Lulu when Koko surfaced from the last of the diving. “We could clean it out. Polish it with sand. Make it into a cauldron. We could cook better meals.”

Koko, shivering, pulled himself up on a rock. Spread himself out over the sun-warmed surface. “We’d have to haul it out before and hide it after. Gonna need poles.”

“The portable pits have handles,” offered Lulu. “I saw one in the humanman camp.”

“We’re not going back to that one. They scared me.”

“We’ll go at night, you big coward.”

Koko was shivering, still. He always had trouble warming up. Lulu put her inner heat in her hands and laid them on his gooseflesh. Pushed her heat into him.

His gooseflesh settled and Koko sighed with relief. He’d always been cold when she was always warm. Which was a devil for him when it snowed. He was always a victim to any kind of chill. Once summer got back into his bones, he was going to be okay.

“Thanks, Lu,” he sighed.

“One day, you’re gonna work out how to stay warm all by yourself.”

“And then who’d cook for you?”

They laughed at their mutual joke.

“So what’cha thinkin’ for dinner?”

“Coal-roasted brains and mushroom-and-mashed-tongue sauce with that lemon-flavoured grass and those nuts you like.”

“Now we  _ have _ to steal that cauldron.”

* * *

 

Magnus was whole and unharmed as he escorted Barry and Lucretia back to the ship. The latter had something in her arms. Wrapped up in Merle’s robes. Barry had her back, and Magnus was riding point, but Lucretia was moving cautiously. Fast, but cautiously. What she carried was important, but desperately fragile.

Davenport stayed out of the way as his remaining crew scurried up the gangplank. Three out of the seven gone. This could not continue.

“What happened to Merle?” he asked, making sure that there were doors between his crew and whatever was out there.

Lucretia was out of breath. Severely out of breath. She pulled aside the bundled robes to reveal…

Merle.

Maybe six years of age, and knocked out.

“If this happened to the twins,” Barry said, “We might never find them.”

“We all remember Scant World,” said Magnus. “The twins saved our butts. Risked their own every night… They never got caught.”

“The question is,” said Davenport, “Do they remember? And if not, how competent were they at their current age?”

Magnus had his  _ Oh Shit _ face on. “I think this world might be in some big, big trouble...”

Lucretia, very carefully, laid Merle down on the rec room couch. Dwarf children were  _ tiny. _ Compact and dense and rumoured to be useful as a bludgeon in a pinch. “Ugh, my arms are  _ jelly…” _

Davenport pre-empted the inevitable, “Burnsides, you do  _ not _ weight-lift your crewmates.”

“Unless they’re into that,” said Magnus.

Everyone except the unconscious Merle rolled their eyes at him.

Davenport cleared his throat. “Hallwinter? Your report?”

“Who?” said Barry. And then he remembered what his actual name was. “Oh. Right. Flora and fauna appear to be congruent with our homeworld norms. Most visible species are similar enough to -uh- be… that’s not what you want to hear.”

“In your own time, Dr Hallwinter.”

“I’m not certain what I saw. It was… large… and it was on Merle and gone before I could get a clear look at it. Maybe Lucretia could--?”

“I’m not drawing anything until I get feeling back in my elbows.” She had her arms straight out and was flapping them hopelessly. “Kid Merle is freaking  _ heavy.” _

Magnus, almost automatically, moved in to give her a massage. He always said that he never had a clever mind, but his body made up for it.

And, having experienced a Magnus-brand massage, Davenport was inclined to agree.

“Miss Clarke? What did you see?”

“I can only describe it as a predatory deer,” she said. “It was… almost deer-shaped. Larger. And the prongs of its horns were pointed forwards. As were its eyes. Except it didn’t have eyes. It had… sockets filled with blackness. And for a moment, just a moment, I swear it grew  _ paws _ and grappled Merle… and then it was gone and I thought he was gone, too, but… the shape of the clothing was wrong. When I picked him up, we heard the foliage move, and… that’s when we ran.”

“And you screamed,” supplied Magnus.

Barry had turned bright red. “Uh. The screaming was me.”

“I swear I heard a girl scream,” said Magnus.

Even brighter. Even redder. “It was me.”

“He does,” said Lucretia. “He screams like a girl.”


	11. Chapter 11

Aubrey turned off the Guiding Light as they approached another campsite. This one was full of arguing and one crying child, huddled up on the picnic bench in a defensive ball. She let Duck step forward and do his routine.

There was absolutely nothing like Duck’s patented laconic unflappability for defusing a situation in progress.

Aubrey almost faded into the background next to the presence of a Uniform of Authority. A smokescreen she used to sit at the bench opposite the kid. She took off the Baby Bjorn and let Doctor Harris Bonkers loose on the tabletop.

Curiosity won out over distress. “...c’n I pet y’r bunny please, lady?”

“Only if you're gentle,” she murmured. “His name is Doctor Harris Bonkers, and he told me that he loves to eat dandelions.”

The kid dotted straight on to some nearby dandelion plants and uprooted one. Before long, they were feeding Doctor Bonkers leaf by leaf and gently petting his fur.

“My name's Aubrey Little,” she said. “What's yours?”

“Alex.”

“Pleased to meet you, Alex. Are you feeling better now?”

“Yes.”

“That's great. I’m glad. What had you so sad, Alex?”

“Dad said I did something with his new barbecue and I never went near it. I saw them, but. I saw the deer kids. The deer kids took it.”

“The deer kids?” echoed Aubrey.

“Yeah. They were spotted like a baby deer.” Alex’s hands moved to indicate places on their own form where these ‘deer kids’ were spotted. “And they had big flappy ears like a deer, too.” Alex’s hands flipped around near their head. “Dad says I made it all up so he yelled at me. It’s a brand new barbecue. Fresh out of the box and the most important bit’s gone missing.”

Aubrey said, “Ooof. I’d be mad if that happened to  _ me _ . Deer kids or no deer kids. I bet they were fast, too.”

Alex nodded. “Super fast. They bounced in and bounced out too quick for me to even say ‘hi’.”

Meanwhile, Duck was spinning up some plausible deniability. “Yeah, we’ve had a lot of trouble recently with local kids creating malarky in the general area. Seeing as you still got the box, I bet you can take it and your instruction manual to Merten’s Hardware, down on Box Creek Street? They could fix you up with some replacement parts, no problem. Meantime my cohort and I will be working on tracking them down. I wouldn’t hold a lot of hope, though, sir. The general theme of said malarky involves fireworks. You may not get your original pieces back as new. Just sayin’.”

Aubrey smiled and scooped up her familiar. “Time for Doctor Bonkers to say goodbye, Alex. It’s been lovely chatting with you.”

Alex waved and said, “Bye, Doctor Bonkers. Thanks for letting me pet you.”

“It was my pleasure,” said Doctor Bonkers.

The look on Alex’s face was priceless.

* * *

 

Lulu had retrieved the deer head  _ and _ set the fire. It was only fair that Koko did the rest. Wild mushrooms. Fresh-harvested herbs. He’d even managed to lay his hands on some treasured salt.

The humanman camp had had it just sitting there out in the open like it wasn’t even valuable. The container was intriguing. Clear, like glass. But it wasn’t glass. And it had moving pieces that turned the crystals inside into a fine powder. It took him a couple of goes to get it, but now he was wielding it like he had always known what it was.

Lulu had found some reasonably large pieces of wood and was using her natural heat magic to burn them into bowls. Scraping them smooth with a river rock. Koko was working on some cutlery. Carving it carefully with one of his broken-glass blades.

“I don’t  _ get _ humanmen,” he said after a lengthy silence as everything simmered. “They have perfectly good houses. We’ve seen them in the humanman city down there. But they make  _ small _ houses out of  _ metal _ and take them into places like this so they can burn food on a fire.”

“It’s like they don’t know how to do anything properly,” said Lulu. She blew ash and charcoal out of her current project. Added clean sand to the inside to make it smoother. “Aunt Ques said that in the long-ago, Elves taught humanmen everything. ‘Bout how to be civilised an’ all.” She shrugged. “Guess it didn’t take.”

Koko thought about that. And the more he thought about it, the more his ears didn’t like it. “Lulu?” he said. “I haven’t seen any sign that Elves are here at all. Like. Ever.”

Lulu sat up bolt straight. Suddenly scared. “You mean… this plane… Has  _ never _ had Elves? How would that even work? Who’d teach them anything?”

“Maybe that’s why they’re so messed up. No Elves to teach them how to do it proper.” Koko gave off carving to stir the contents of their strange, humanman cauldron. And a worse thought appeared in his brain like a fly in a good bowl of soup. “Lulu… they don’t know what we are. They’re gonna be afraid of us. They won’t even know we’re just kids.”

Lulu put down her work and crossed the space between them to cuddle up with him. “Hey. Hey. Listen. Just breathe, okay? We’re alive today. We’re not dead yet.”

He nuzzled into her and grounded himself with her scent. “Not the best sales pitch, Lulu.”

She rocked him and hummed for him. Then singsonged, “It’s gonna be okay… Stop being a big scaredy cat.... You huge dingus.”

There was a weird bird in the distance. One that didn’t sound like a bird.  _ Chk-whrrr… chk-whrrr… _ But it was far away and not coming any closer, so Koko tried not to pay it any mind.

But there were strange things in this forest. And humanmen were coming too close. Sure, they had some useful shit, but…

Humanmen who were scared were prone to acts of violence.

“C’mon. Let’s finish up these things. I’m sick of eating off of leaves.”

Yeah. That was a thing. Having cutlery and bowls was way better than leaves and fingers. And since dinner was nearly ready, he should probably hurry it up a little.

The deer head, once extracted from the coals, split with a judicious blow from Lulu’s rock, and divided evenly into their new bowls, tasted  _ fantastic _ with the thick sauce Koko had made. Almost perfect.

_ Chk-whrrr… chk-whrrr… chk-whrrr... _

“Could’a done with a little more garlic,” he said.

“No, this is the perfect amount of garlic,” she said.

_ Chk-whrrr... _

“Come on, Lulu. I hardly put any at all in there.”

“Exactly. Perfect amount of garlic.”

_ Chk-whrrr… chk-whrrr… _

“I am going to find that shitty bird. I am going to find it. And kill it. And roast it. And serve it up with some nice vegetables so it will  _ shut the heck up…” _

“Koko, cool it. It’s just a dumb bird.”

And then there were some mutual cries from humanmen. Right where the bird was.

They didn’t stop to think. Just fled up the nearest tree and hoped for the best.

Dangit. He really  _ liked _ that cauldron, too.


	12. Chapter 12

Ned had known that a Gilly Suit would be a fantastic investment for… let’s call it his  _ night job. _ It was perfect. This way, he could creep around unobserved and unnoticed. Especially with that army surplus scent obfuscating stuff he had slathered both himself and his gilly suit with.

And now he was using it to get two kinds of authentic photos. The blurry, slightly-out-of-focus kind used exclusively for thrilling tabloid trash, and the sharp, clear, accurate kind necessary for actual detective work on his  _ night job. _

He was quite some distance away, but it looked like those pointy ears could hear the damn camera.

One of these alien twins kept triangulating on the shutter noise and looking directly into his telephoto lens. Which was good for the clear photos, not so much for the unclear ones.

An anthropologist may have been fascinated. They were making themselves bowls and eating utensils, which they then used to devour a deer brain and some kind of sauce.

Which, when the wind blew his way, smelled distractingly delicious.

Ned contained his drool and crept around for another angle. They really were identical. The hair, the dapling of their skin. Everything but the eyes.

It would be interesting to see how they broke camp. If they left their improvised cauldron or figured out a way to take it with them.

And it explained the row of eyes in the night. They had seen him, as they were standing or sitting together in the shrubbery. Possibly frozen in fear, the poor creatures. And then something made them blink and run. Odd, though, that on the night he encountered them, he thought it was a much,  _ much _ larger entity.

That was a mystery for another day. Ned purposely de-focussed his lens  _ just _ enough. Waited for them to get casual…

And got his ass tripped over by some schlub.

Judging by the yelp, it was none other than the esteemed Lady Flame.

Ned re-focussed, and there was nothing of the aliens but a campsite. He swore. Stood. Took the hat/hood arrangement off. “You spooked them.”

“Well it’s not every day I trip over a moving shrubbery,” snapped Aubrey.

“Excuse you. I happen to be a hedge. Moving along, can I assume that the three of us are on the same trail?”

Duck, standing judgmentally nearby, lowered his gaze to the camera, then came back to Ned’s face. “And the fact that you’ll have exclusive photos of your ‘forest spirits’ will have nothin’ to do with it, of course.”

“You wound me, Duck. You wound me. I was out seeking to gather more intelligence for our covert organisation, in the event that some ancient or arcane knowledge could therefore become more easily accessible. Either from anthropological deduction, or simple observation. The fact that some examples of my resultant photography would be beneficial to my establishment is mere co-incidence and the result of a shaky hand on my part. It is, after all, my premiere experience in obtaining portraiture of real live genuine fucking aliens.”

Duck said, “Uhuh. Which one’s the headliner, so far?”

Ned moved to show him the digital photo roll “I have a rather excellent one of them dividing up some roasted deer brains… Just the right mix of gore and that what-the-fuck  _ je ne sais quoi.” _

Aubrey stretched to peer at it. “Eeeeuuuww,” she said appreciatively.

“Never underestimate the survival potential of brains, dear Lady Flame,” expounded Ned. “Why, in neolithic times, the brains and the marrow in the long bones were the next best thing to canned food. Highest in nutritional potential, and often brought back to the camp to feed the ladies and the little ones. As you can see in  _ this _ portrait, they’d already excised the tongue for their meal. Very practical little B.E.M.’s these two.”

“B- E- what now?” said Aubrey.

Ned looked mournfully at her and sighed, “Kids these days… B.E.M. Short for Bug-Eyed Monster. The staple of the nascent science fiction film industry. Why, back in my day…”

“Nineteen forty-four?” said Aubrey in mock-helpfulness.

“I will thank you to cease speculations in regards to my vintage...”

Duck put his hands up in a settle-down posture. “That’s all well and good, but y’all should hush this up. I reckon our little friends might still be in the area.”

Ned hopefully raised his camera.

Aubrey instantly fell to whispering. “Do you see them?”

“Nope,” said Duck, “but their cooking gear is gone.”

Sure enough, there was nothing left of the campsite but some smouldering embers and some discarded bones. The abandoned bowls, the stolen part of the barbecue, and even the single, carved spork was no longer there.

The woods fell preternaturally silent.

The trio automatically backed into a circle.

Leaves rustled without any wind.

And the beast…

Struck.


	13. Chapter 13

Koko reached out for Lulu. Lulu reached out for Koko. They almost dropped their hard-won cauldron in their terror.

The  _ thing _ had come back.

Deer shaped, but not a deer. More like a dragon but without the essential  _ dragonosity _ that might have made it actually draconic.

The humanman hedge pulled something out of his clothing. There were four extremely loud bangs. And a scream. And a pile of fabric where the humanman hedge had been.

And they  _ remembered… _

_ They were on a scouting mission. Exploring the immediate area around where they’d landed the Starblaster. Seeking forage. Seeking information. Seeking whatever happened to be useful, and the twins had an eye for anything that could be useful. And fingers light enough to take it right out of the pockets of whoever had it at the time. _

_ They had been idly wondering about the trilithon in the middle of nowhere, but not too hard. _

_ Because there was a deer nearby and venison was always a welcome feast for the crew. _

_ Taako didn’t even have time to draw his wand, because it was on them both in instants. _

And in minutes, they remembered their entire lives. It left them reeling. Exhausted. Out of breath. Sick to their stomachs.

Lup spoke. Barely whispering. “That thing… it ate our lives.”

“It reset our lives,” he whispered back. Automatically using a version of  _ Us _ that was far more sophisticated than the one they’d been using bare minutes ago.

Below them, the humanmen were excavating their newly seven-year-old ally.

“That was a gun,” said Lup. “They were trying to kill it with a gun.”

“Uhm,” said Taako. “Is it creepy that the giant rabbit down there is looking straight at us?”

“It can’t see us. We have natural camouflage. My question is why is the female humanman carrying it around?”

“Lunch?” suggested Taako.

And then the rabbit narrowed its pink eyes at them and said, in perfect  _ Us, _ “I am not on the menu. Yours or anyone’s.”

The humanman carrying it turned and said,  _ “What was that, Doctor Bonkers?” _

Too late, of course. Lup and Taako were bouncing from branch to branch, getting as far away from these humanmen as possible.

They had  _ learned _ across the multiple worlds they had seen, what happened when humans on a techworld with guns did to non-humans without them. So it was in their best interests to get the hell out of there before the bullets started flying their way. All the way to the safety of their cote, where they hid with the still-warm cauldron and found comfort in each other’s arms.

“How?” said Lup. “That was  _ Us. _ Only  _ we _ know it.”

“That  _ thing. _ Did this to us. I remember. It grabbed you and started… and I tried…” the memories were fading. The links to his past/future were fading. “Lup. Lulu. Where’s the Starblaster?”

“I.. I don’t…” Lulu blinked. Frowned. “What’s a Starblaster?”

Koko tried. “There was… a silver ship… friends… people who loved us.”

“You mean like Mama and Aunt Ques and our Uncles Torte and Ench?”

He was grasping at vapours, now. “They weren’t afraid of our eyes.” Some part of him understood how much he had just lost. How much was gone. But all he could remember was that these friends he couldn’t remember… they weren’t afraid.

Lulu snorted. “Only family’s not afraid of  _ our _ eyes.”

Koko was still trying to reach it. He felt so close to some answers. “...maybe they  _ were _ family…”

* * *

 

“What was that, Doctor Bonkers?”

A set of branches rustled suddenly, like something jumped off them in a great hurry.

“A grievous error,” said the rabbit. “You recall how a significant mishap left me with the ability of speech and rational thought?”

“Can’t exactly forget it,” said Duck, he was busy digging a very young Ned Chicane out of his clothing. “Huh. Even wore that dang corset inside his gilly suit.”

And inside the corset was a very small, very scrawny, impossibly adorable Li’l Neddy. “WhateverIdidI’mverysorryandpleasedon’ttellmymom.” He had a missing tooth and everything. Freckles. Scruffy, curly hair. He was officially Li’l Rascals Cute.

“I’m pretty sure we won’t be able to,” murmured Aubrey.

“As it happens,” said Doctor Bonkers, “I can understand and speak any spoken language. I thought that conversing with our woodland friends in their own tongue might help calm them and open an avenue for continued negotiations.”

“That bunny can talk.  _ Why _ can that bunny talk?”

“I take it you don’t recall the immediate past there, Ned...dy…?”

“In my defence, I believe my place on the menu was a topic of conversation,” continued Doctor Bonkers, ten-pound New Zealand White. “Since I have no desire to become Hasenpfeffer, I rather stepped on that possibility too firmly.”

“Doctor Bonkers, have you been hanging out with… Mr Chicane a little too long?” asked Aubrey.

“Perhaps,” he allowed. “The point remains that I overstepped and spooked them.”

“How do you know my name? How can the  _ rabbit _ be  _ talking? _ Also please don’t say a  _ word _ to my dad, he’s gonna  _ whip meeee…” _

Duck dug a small packet out of his Fanny Pack of Necessity. “Here. These’ll be your size.”

“The rabbit is talking because I’m a magician,” said Aubrey, producing a few sparkles on cue. “And he’s  _ magical.” _

“I’m actually semi-magical,” corrected Doctor Bonkers. “Quasi-magical. The margarine of magical…”

Li’l Neddy, partway through getting his emergency briefs on, said, “What’s margarine?”

“...oh my god…” snickered Aubrey. “...he’s older than margarine…”

“I doubt that’s possible,” said Duck, “it was invented in eighteen thirteen. Now, everybody.”

“DUCK NEWTON!”

“Dangit, Minerva! We have a  _ situation, _ here!”

Li’l Neddy lost his sweet, seven-year-old mind. “IT’S THE BLUE FAIRY! IT’S THE BLUE FAIRY! SHE’S GONNA GRANT ME A WISH! Please blue fairy I’ve tried to be real good I promise all I want is a permanent job for my dad so’s he’ll stop whippin’ on me I promise I’ll stop stealin’ just  _ PLEASE?” _

“I DO NOT UNDERSTAND, SMALLER HUMAN. MORE IMPORTANT MATTERS ARE AT HAND. DUCK NEWTON, YOU MUST TAKE CARE, THE CHI--” she faded out. Flickered. “--N ARE N--” flicker “--HARMED. WATCH FOR TH--” flicker “--IN RED RO--” and she was gone.

Li’l Neddy, now in a decent pair of briefs and a Monongahela T-shirt with the slogan,  _ Take a walk on the wild side! _ Stepped out from Adult-Ned’s pool of clothing. Crept up to Aubrey, who popped a squat to meet him eye to eye. “Yes, young sir?”

“D’you have a knife I can borrow, please, ma’am?”

“Uuhhh…” said Aubrey. “I dunno about letting kids play with knives…”

“I need it, please?”

She had a sinking sensation where this was going, but her and her big yap just had to go on ahead anyway. “What do you need it for?”

“I gotta cut a switch for when my dad finds out about this. I was naked in the woods inside some…” he lowered his voice to a whisper, “ladies’ things…” and then back to normal. “He’s gonna find out and he’s gonna skin me alive for it. But maybe not if’n I get ahead of it and have the switch ready fo--”

Aubrey snatched him up in a huge hug. “No he’s not. Not on my watch, kiddo. You’re safe, now, Neddy. You’re safe. Nobody’s gonna hurt you.”

Doctor Bonkers said, “Children find petting my fur to be therapeutic. You may give it a try if you wish…”

He did. Tentative and cautious. “Wow. You’re really soft.”

“Thank you.”

“Now I know what  _ Bye Baby Bunting _ is all about.” Then he realised who he was saying that in front of. “Sorry.”

“I am beginning,” said Doctor Bonkers, “to sense a theme.”

Duck was busy massaging his temples. “I can’t deal with this here. I  _ can’t _ deal with this here…”

“You can’t deal with this  _ here,” _ supplied Aubrey, unhelpfully. “Okay. Let’s everyone grab some stuff… aaannnd we can bring it up to the Lodge and try to work things out from there? Okay? Okay.”

Li’l Neddy lifted exactly one garment and shrieked. “That’s a gun!”

“I can’t  _ deal _ with this here.”


	14. Chapter 14

Meanwhile, on the Starblaster…

“Get back here, ya li’l nudist!”

“Wheeee! I’m  _ nature!” _

“Go ‘round and head ‘im off at the pass!”

“I told you not to give him sugar.”

“I didn’t give him sugar. Just  _ catch _ him!”

Barry was the one who caught Merle up in both towel and hug. “Gotcha!”

The remaining three ganged up on him.

“Underpants!”

“Socks!”

“Pajam-jams!”

“You hold him down, I’ll button him.”

“NO!” Baby-Merle screamed. “Nooooooooo!”

The four adults separated.

“There,” panted their Captain. “He’s ready for bed.”

“NOOOOOOOOO!”

“Gods. So much drama for someone so  _ small…” _ sighed Lucretia.

“Honestly,” said Barry. “You’d think he didn’t want a hot chocolate.”

Merle instantly quieted. “I wanna hot chocolate,” he mumbled.

“Young man,” said Davenport. “If you want rewards on this ship, you have to earn them. And that means taking a bath and getting ready for bed with no more of this malarky. Yes, sir!”

“...essir,” echoed a very cowed baby Merle. “...’m sorry.”

Davenport gave an approving nod. “Good. Since this is a first offence, I’ll let you off with a warning. There will be no others. Understood?”

Merle nodded.

“Dr Hallwinter. Prepare young Mr Highchurch a mixture of honey and milk as described in the kitchen book.”

Magnus said, “But that’s the--mmf mmff mmff mmf mf mmmff.” Because he suffered a sudden attack of Lucretia’s hand over his big, fat, loud mouth.

“The super special one,” said Lucretia over Magnus’ protests. “With the  _ nutmeg _ in it.” She added a glare straight into Magnus’ eyes that said,  _ Don’t fuck this up, dum-dum. _

“Oh. Yeah. Right. The  _ special _ drink with the  _ nutmeg…” _

And it was also the one, they knew, that could knock out just about anyone before they got to the dregs. Barry’s had to have almond milk instead of the regular kind, on account of his troubles, but the nutmeg still worked its magic.

And it definitely worked its magic on Merle. He was half asleep when Barry guided him to his bunk and out like a light in minutes.

Four adults. Technically adults if you counted Magnus - previous baby of the crew. And they could barely keep up with a six-year-old Dwarf.

“We  _ have _ to get the Light,” moaned Lucretia. “Maybe it could cure this… affliction.”

“We have to find the twins before they happen to anyone,” said Barry, joining her in a slump on the rec room couch.

“It’s been way more than two days,” said Magnus. “Too late.”

“We need to find what did this to them and reverse engineer the spell,” said Davenport. “I’m a Captain, not a daycare manager.”

“We need a better battle plan,” said Magnus. “Any ideas, Barry?”

Barry’s only answer was a deep snore. Lucretia had the same plan.

Magnus looked at the two of them, eyes already heavy, and managed to haul himself to his feet. “Sorry, Cap’n’port… I think we all need some Z’s first,” and stumbled off to his own quarters.

Davenport, defeated, slunk to the softness of the nearest fantasy bean bag. He should have known. The first day as a parent always knocked one out. And he, too, was asleep before he could sigh twice.

* * *

 

There had been a shopping trip, as there had been for all of Kepler’s sudden influx of mystery children. While Kepler didn’t exactly have a big box store, it did have more than a few modern conveniences. And more than enough to stun Li’l Neddy into something akin to culture shock.

“So… there’s no rationing?” he said. “I can just…  _ have _ shoes? And new clothes? Just like that?”

“More or less, yeah. There’s still a budget and stuff, but… you can have whatever you like,” said Aubrey.

“So howcome you have holes in your nylons?”

“It’s called  _ fashion, _ kid. I’m sure that was invented before you were born.”

“Is that why the pants with the holes in are more expensive than the ones without?”

“Yeah, pretty much. You want holes, you pay extra. Otherwise, make your own.”

Li’l Neddy picked out some practical clothing. Hard-wearing jeans. Tough, canvas shorts with an abundance of pockets. Shirts that could not possibly offend anyone by virtue of not having any kind of message on them.

“Will I be here long enough to go to church?” he asked, arms full of socks and underwear.

Aubrey’s brain imploded at the thought of someone like  _ Ned fucking Chicane _ ever worrying about going to church. “I honestly don’t know,” she said. “Besides, I’d much rather spend my Sunday mornings sleeping in and watching cartoons, wouldn’t you?”

Li’l Neddy looked stunned that that was even a possibility. “Oh no, I have to go to Church ‘cause of how Momma always says that I need the devil drove outta me. And anyways I don’t wanna go to… you know…  the bad place.”

Good grief. Okay. “Are you happy going there?”

Li’l Neddy shrugged.

“Well. If you don’t know, then that’s a ‘no’. And here? With me? It’s okay to say ‘no’. So. Do you  _ want _ to go to church?”

Neddy thought about this for a long time. “...no?”

“Then you don’t have to go. I can tell you right now that the devil can find men who go to church just as fast as he can find a sinner. You choose to do good or bad. That’s what decides where you go. Okay?”

Another long and deep thought process. “...’kay…”

“Awright. Now let’s look at the pyjamas…”


	15. Chapter 15

Duck was walking the trails. Tracking. Of course, the usual abomination didn’t like to act during the daylight. The sudden influx of found children and the sudden rise of missing people were linked only in the  _ Pine Guard _ files. They happened at dusk or dawn. More likely into the early hours of the night than the wee small hours of the morning. The times when people were wont to be out.

The latest missing person was a little old lady. And the latest found child had a vast disparity of technical know-how between modern kids and herself. Some assumed that maybe she might have been Amish or nearly Amish. But that wasn’t what was on his mind. What mattered was finding where the beasts liked to lurk. If he could find a consistent pattern of behaviour, he could head them off at the pass and reduce the hunting times. Reduce the count of victims.

And these ‘wood spirit’ camps were ruining his day.

“Ah, Duck, any word on our survivalist out there?”

Duck sighed. Got back to them on the radio. “Yeah, I found the last cookin’ site. They’re long gone. Looks like they’re brachiating as part of their escape plan to avoid gettin’ tracked. Might could get ol’ Dwayne out to sniff ‘em down.” Old Dwayne was the best bloodhound in the county. In fact, if he was allowed to have pets in his flat, he might have got his own bloodhound and not run the risk of Old Dwayne’s handler Clarence seeing something that he really should not.

Bigfoot, Chupacabra, Mothman… or… ‘Pugwanchinah’. With that thought in his head, he said. “I’m gonna try a few li’l tricks. Try an’ find ‘em before we have t’ give Clarence fifty bucks.”

The crew on the other side chuckled as they said, “You go on ahead with that, Duck.”

There were more than a few sites where the ‘survivalist’ had been cooking. Leaving a dying fire and a delicious smell, and little other trace. He had a general area where these aliens liked to cook. He knew from other hints that there was an area they liked to forage.

Therefore, he had an area where they liked to operate.

If he didn’t find a way to dialogue with the aliens, things could break real bad, real quick.

Duck gave off tracking the beast to get into the middle of the aliens’ zone, and made himself comfortable. Time to test his Fanny Pack of Necessity. He unzipped it and said, “Okay. I need something that the two aliens operatin’ around here won’t resist.” He dipped his hand inside…

And came out with a rectangle wrapped in waxed paper. He unfolded it in his palm.

Honeycomb.

Actual honeycomb.

Well. This was a case of patient persistence.

Duck put his back to a large, free-standing stone. Kept his left hand with the unwrapped honeycomb on his knee. And put his right hand behind his back. And waited.

It didn’t take very long to hear hushed voices in the foliage. Speaking in another language. Casing the entirety of the little clearing where Duck had made his stand. Or, if one might prefer, sit.

“It’s all right,” he said, keeping his voice calm and soothing. “I mean y’all no harm.”

And there they were. Dropping out of a tree like little miracles. Almost completely identical. Save for their heterochromia. Both wearing older-style shirts that had once fit their adult forms. On them, now, they were dresses. Reading their eyes left to right, they were green-amber and amber-green. Duck hoped that he would soon have names to match their odd eyes.

He put on his Chosen One Charm. Smiled warmly for them. “Well hello, there. Nice t’ meet you.” Just a small nod towards the contents of his left hand. “You can take it. I won’t move a muscle, I promise.”

He almost held his breath as Green-Amber crept forward. Amber-Green held onto their hand, but hung back. Halfway ready to bolt.

Duck kept himself as still as possible. Keeping his promise. Even as they both darted back with their prize. Split it in two and began chewing on it.

“See? I want us to be friends,” he said. Slowly, carefully, he took out two more wrapped rectangles from the bag. Peeled the wax paper off them enough to show them it was the same stuff. “I just want to talk, okay? I reckon you both are lost, and there’s people who might be lookin’ for you. I want to help you get to help. To people who know you. Now I’m one of the few around these parts who know that there’s… unusual things happenin’.” He stopped talking while they each snatched a parcel. “I’m used to it. Other people are like t’ draw a gun on y’all.”

They were crouched together, nibbling on honeycomb. Green-Amber spoke. “You were with the talking rabbit woman.”

_ Thank the Lord Almighty they speak English… _ Duck breathed a little more freely. “Her name’s Aubrey, and if you listen to her for longer than thirty seconds, you’ll learn that the rabbit’s name is Doctor Harris Bonkers,” he smiled. “She’s a li’l strange, I grant. But around these here parts, she fits right in. She’s a good friend, and so’s her rabbit.”

Amber-Green turned to their twin and murmured something in another language. Green-Amber responded in kind. A little conversation. A little argument. Amber-Green seemed the more wary of the two. Evaluating Duck as he sat there and did his patented who-harmless-li’l-ol’-me? routine. No doubt, that kid could see Duck evaluating them just as quick as they were evaluating him.

It was because of that evaluating stare that he added the truth. “I’m Duck Newton,” he said. There was no real need to  explain that it was a nickname. “And it’s my  _ job _ to keep everyone in this forest safe,” he said.

In one blink, Amber-Green made up their mind. Said something to their twin, who nodded.

“I’m Lulu,” said the twin with green-amber eyes. “This is my dumb baby brother Koko.”

Koko mumbled something about forty-five minutes and Duck knew, just  _ knew, _ that it was the time-honoured argument between twins. Who was older, and by how long.

“Pleased to meet you, Lulu, Koko. Now. I’d like to move around a bit, because this ain’t comfortable. We cool?”

They exchanged looks. “Sure?”

“...thank you Jesus,” Duck muttered, and began stretching his corking muscles with much moaning and some mild cusses. Which seemed to amuse the twins. Part of him wished that he was doing this at twenty. Or even less. When he actually had the ready mobility for this crap. He put up with it until he was on his feet and then murmured, “One day, you will be old. And y’all might even regret makin’ fun here and now.”

“Pffft, yeah,” said Lulu. “When we’re six hundred, maybe.”

Koko giggled at that.

Either they were really long-lived little aliens, or they were really cheeky kids. Hard to tell from where he was standing. “I ain’t gonna disrupt wherever it is that y’all have as a place of safety. What I need is for y’all to stop lighting fires because my organisation’s job is to protect this forest as well as everyone in there. Now I can show you where you can cook without causing any kind of fuss ‘mongst anybody. Hell,” he ignored their gasps and giggles, “they can probably help you blend in ‘round here.”

“We can mess you up if you try anything bad, mister,” said Lulu.

“Wouldn’t dream of trying,” said Duck.


	16. Chapter 16

“What gets me,” said Lucretia, “Is that Merle was behind the both of us when the Beast attacked. It could have got to either of us first, but… It went straight for--” she stopped cold, seeing a certain small topic of conversation. “Hello, Merle. Sleep well?”

Barry turned with a blatantly fake smile. “He-e-ey, little buddy. No trouble today, okay? We need all our energy for working out how to make things better. Get you back to your old self.”

“Was I sick?” said Merle. “I don’t remember being sick.”

“You weren’t sick,” said Lucretia. “Something attacked you and hurt you in a really weird way. We’re just trying to get things back to normal. And we need the smartest people for figuring things out.”

“Aaawww…” whined baby Merle. “Who’s gonna play with me?”

“We happen to know someone who has  _ lots _ of energy and just  _ loves _ to play,” said Lucretia.

And right on cue, Magnus came into the strategy room. “Are my ears burning? ‘Cause I followed the instructions for some gosh-darn delicious pancakes, and-- hey! Hi! It’s the  _ little _ little guy. Pancakes all around, right?”

Lucretia took a deep, centering breath. They weren’t going to make any progress with baby Merle around. “Let’s all make pancakes,” she said.

“Huzzah,” baby Merle cheered.

“Huzzah!” Magnus cheered along.

“...huzzah,” muttered Barry.

“Pancakes,” deadpanned Lucretia. “Yay.”

Even with instructions, even with the best kitchen that could be squeezed into the Starblaster, it took them way too long and ended up looking like it exploded. And they got a percentage of it all over their clothes. Which meant more baths, and the potential for another naked baby Merle running a game of chase all over the Starblaster.

And the pancakes didn’t turn out properly. They were doughy and undercooked and something had gone so very wrong with one of the ingredients that made the results taste incredibly suspicious.

Taako must have left off a step by accident. Or more than a step.

“We have to find the twins,” said Barry.

“But first,” said Lucretia. “We have to bathe the Merle.”

“Our captain’s been conspicuous by his absence,” offered Magnus.

“You’re volunteering me for  _ what _ now?” said their Captain, once again hidden by the presence of the table. He had a fishing rod in one hand and an enormous fish in the other. “What in the gods’ names happened in here?”

“Accident?” suggested Magnus.

“You accidentally got  _ five _ pancakes stuck to the ceiling?”

The excuses flooded out. Barry told them trying to flip a pancake like a pro was a mistake, and they should focus on doing the little ones. Lucretia insisted that slow and steady mixing was the way to go, but baby Merle -I’M NOT A BABY!- wanted the pancakes  _ now _ and insisted on trying to speed things up despite a marked lack of co-ordination. Magnus swore that there was something wrong with the eggs but he couldn’t tell  _ how _ they were wrong, and not one of them knew how to get milk out of almonds, so…

“So basically,” said their Captain. “Not one of you were capable of following the instructions that were clearly written down. Even though one of you did the writing.”

Four mumbled, “Yessir”s came out on top of each other.

“I’m going to clean this fish. I expect the four of you to have cleaned this kitchen before I get back.”

“Yessir.”

Face burning, Lucretia began scooping up the largest portions of pancake mess. Even baby Merle was trying his best to mop everything up.

Like it or not, Captain Davenport was clearly the only authority capable of successfully handling baby Merle. She’d have to talk to him about it. Calmly, logically, rationally, and using all her observations to back up the chain of rationale that boiled down to  _ not me. _ Everyone knew she couldn’t command a candle to burn if she had a match. She lacked gravitas. She lacked authority. She lacked  _ spine. _

Even ordering a little kid around was beyond her.

“I’m hungry,” whined baby Merle.

“We  _ need _ to find the twins,” sighed Lucretia. And for the first time in her memory, everyone agreed with her.


	17. Chapter 17

Barclay had just finished the lunch rush when the special knock came at the staff entrance. This was now Pine Guard business. Or Jake had forgotten his keys again and didn’t want to wait for Barclay to finish up with whatever he was in the middle of at the time. He opened the door with, “Jake, if you forgot your keys again--”

But it wasn’t Jake.

It was Duck.

And the two aliens that Ned had been bulshitting about as ‘Pugwanchinah’ in his Cryptonomica. Almost identical. Spotted like a baby fawn. Sniffing the air and frowning in confusion. And since Ned was monolingual, they had to understand English.

“Well howdy,” he said. “I bet you can tell I ain’t human.” He undid his bracelet as he explained it. “This here helps me blend in. You see. There’s a lot of non-humans here in the Amnesty Lodge.”

They startled when the True Seeming dropped. Clung to each other, but stayed more or less where they started. An immediately started talking in the language of the Really Old Ones. The High Folk. The Wise Ones. Humans knew them as Elves.

His command of the language was spotty and weak, but he caught the words,  _ bugbear, ogre, _ and,  _ eat. _ Eat used in the hostile sense of the word.

He still didn’t believe it. But he went down on one knee and showed proper respect and, in what little of their tongue he knew, he said,  _ “Are you of the Old High Folk?” _

_ “He speaks Elvish? But these are clearly humanman lands.” _

_ “Slow it down, he doesn’t talk it well.” _

Duck said, “You understand this?”

“Mostly,” Barclay allowed. “These little ones… your kind know them as Elves. They haven’t been seen since the death of Dragons.”

“Most  _ not-Elves _ want to eat us,” said one of the twins. Using the Old Tongue word for anyone who wasn’t an Elf. “So we heard.”

Barclay threw up in his mouth a little. “That’s disgusting. I can’t even think of anyone wanting--” He had to sit. Reflexively tightened his bracelet again. “I’m sorry for not welcoming you properly… y-you’re legends. Myths.”

“I’m a myth,” said the other twin. Then pointed to the sibling, “He’th a mythter.” And then they both giggled.

And despite that, he still had tears in his eyes. Wonder in his heart. “Please be real?” he offered his hand.

They looked questioningly at each other, then up to Duck.

“Look, I ain’t got no clue about what’s goin’ down here,” said Duck. “I’m just tryin’ to stop fires happening in the forest, and avoid undue attention towards these li’l folks. You  _ can _ help, right?”

Those shirts were made for adults. Which meant that they had been struck by what some (Aubrey) insisted on calling the Time-Sucker. Which may also mean that the shirts were the  _ only _ thing they were wearing. All he could think of were the old tales, and the punishments the Old Ones doled out to anyone they thought was cruel to one of their rare and precious children. And the kindness they visited on the ones who showed said children kindness.

Odds were, half of those old stories were horseshit, but there was no telling which half it was.

And then he remembered that kindness to a child was just being decent. “It would be my honour. But I have to talk to some people. Arrange things. I can show you where we’d like to… well… keep you comfortable. You’ll never have a worry.”

Again, the twins looked at each other in vague concern. “Uh. We don’t have any gold.”

“We got some stuff.”

“Like, most of a dead deer? Is that good for trade?”

“You don’t understand,” said Barclay. “You can stay here for free. You can eat here for free. We will give you good clothes and everything else you might need.”

“But… this is a business,” said one. “You need to do business.”

“It isn’t right,” said the other one. “It’s stealing.”

“You don’t steal from  _ nice _ people.”

“Koko, shoosh!”

Koko’s ears flipped back and his hair spontaneously curled. “I dunno where that came from,” he said. “My memory’s been funny ever since… I saw the  _ thing _ again.”

“What  _ thing?” _ said the other.

“The  _ thing. _ It made the old humanman be a baby one. You don’t remember? There was a gun?”

“What’s a gun?”

Koko scrubbed their fingers through their hair. “Lulu… I’m trying so hard to work things out, and you’re always the smart one and you not remembering is not helping here. Can you  _ try _ to  _ remember _ what happened?”

“Please, honoured ones,” begged Barclay. “There’s no need for distress. We will take care of everything.”

“Awright, awright. Stop. Let’s everybody calm down. Okay. Barclay, these kids want to pay you and they got a dead deer. I say we arrange for something and keep it off the books. If necessary, I can call it a culling. Now. You two… Lulu, Koko. I’d appreciate it if y’all didn’t stress about this. You have yourself a kind offer, you made a kind offer in return. It’s all good. What we  _ need _ here is some True Seemings or a place for these youngins to hide. Okay. Is that do-able?”

“Oh. Oh! Right.” Barclay scrambled to his feet. “We always have a stock of Blanks for emergencies. They’ll just hide every non-human attribute, I can Tune them for each of you. It won’t take long.”

They looked like the typical gimcrack available in the Lodge gift shop. Little charm bracelets with one charm. Only the fact that Barclay kept them in a safe meant that they were not meant for regular clients. “We have campfires, bears, pine trees, and telescopes. You can have one.”

Lulu picked the campfire. Koko took longer to pick the bear.

“Now. What’s about to happen is an illusion,” Barclay said. “It’s going to fool  _ everybody. _ You’re going to look, feel, and smell human. But you are still you. It’s gonna be scary, but it’s okay. You can take these off any time and be back to normal. All right?”

Lulu was the first one to put the bracelet on. Koko shrieked, “Your eyes! Your ears!”

Lulu’s eyes had round pupils, but still had heterochromia. The golden freckles on Lulu’s skin were gone. Lulu still had a few vitiligo spots, and the darker moles. Lulu’s hair was now a more normal-looking colour.

Koko reached out to touch. “You’re human. You’re actually human.”

“It’s a Seeming. It’s not real. It only  _ seems _ real,” insisted Barclay. “You can go back to normal by taking it off at any time.”

Lulu did so, returning to Elven form. “See, dingus? I’m fine. Stop being a scaredy-cat.”

Barclay was trying not to faint. He could see the wands tucked into the braids in their hair. They could wreak any kind of vengeance for the slightest infraction if they so chose. All the ancient tales told of the wonders that the High Folk could perform. And all of the horrors they could perform, too.

“You’re scared of us,” said Koko. “Why? We’re just kids.”

Barclay went with honesty. “There’s a lot of old stories. I doubt many of them are true, but… Some of them are frightening.”

“Like how bugbears make Elf stew?” said Koko.

“I’m not a bugbear.”

“You… look enough like one, though.”

“Looks aren’t everything. A wasp can look like a bee, but it would never make honey.”

“M’kay,” said Koko. “How’s about you don’t try to eat us and we won’t… Idunno… surround you with magic tentacles or whatever it is you heard.”

Barclay chuckled. “It’s a deal.” He explained about the Tuning, and how it was designed to make certain that nobody did anything non-human while they Seemed human. If they needed to do anything non-human, they had to be sure they weren’t seen.

They found that to be incredibly funny.

“Dude, we’ve been around here for weeks,” said Lulu. “Humans have only seen us maybe twice.”

“What’re they gonna do? Talk about it? Get locked up for seeing Elves?” said Koko. Feeling his rounded ears. “This is  _ so _ weird…”

Duck sighed, “They’ve done a li’l bit more than see you…”


	18. Chapter 18

Lucretia was best at scouting. Anything could mess up Barry’s glasses and Magnus… was possibly the most unobservant person on the planet. Davenport was the most likely to get a response out of baby Merle, and Barry knew the most about interspecies junior care, so it was her and Magnus working on tracking the twins.

Good news - they were humans. And therefore less likely to cause alarm amongst the natives.

Bad news - the twins weren’t. Figuring out how to ask about that sort of thing would likely cause more than raised eyebrows.

How in the hell was she going to explain the twins’ ears? They fell into a mechanical rice picker? No. Just… no. Better that they just found the twins and used a combination of Elven, honeycombs, and Magnus’ natural puppy-like nature to win them back onto the Starblaster.

They found where the twins had gone. Almost crossing the path of a native human before dashing off, deeper into the woods. They found where the twins had been attacked and ominously small, bare footprints in the earth before they vanished without a trace.

“Did it eat them?” said Magnus.

“There’d be something left. Not nothing. This is an orderly bail-out. Not an attack,” said Lucretia. She looked up. “They went into the trees. When the twins were kids, the Xenophobia wars were petering out. They would have been taught essential survival skills from birth.”

“Okay. And those are?”

“Get into the trees, find water. Find shelter. Find food. And… don’t trust anyone but an Elf.”

Magnus thought about this for all of five seconds. “Well, tits.”

“Yes,” said Lucretia. “This is an intensely boobular situation.” she ignored Magnus’ giggles. “An Elf can travel for fifteen miles per day. Assume they wouldn’t want to be in the open for any longer than they had to…” Lucretia cast around. Found some signs of foraging. And found more signs of foraging a little further along. “They went this way.”

“How can you tell?”

Lucretia showed him the berry bushes, and how certain areas had been picked clean. “Taako always had a sweet tooth.”

It took them most of the day to find the cote. Almost perfect for twin Elves’ security needs. It had been recently cleaned out. They’d moved elsewhere.

And there was a native boot-print in the soil near twin footprints.

“They were found by a native and  _ went calmly?” _ she said. And then she found a chewed-up ball of wax on the ground. “Oh no,” she sighed. “Oh  _ no…” _

“What? What’s so special about wax?”

“Not just any wax. Bee’s wax.” Lucretia’s mind was whirling with potential disaster. “Someone else knows about honeycomb.” Dread filled her heart. “Young Elves would do just about anything for honeycomb. Even forget about stranger danger.”

Magnus realised the severity of the situation. “We have to hurry. They could be doing  _ anything _ to the twins.”

* * *

 

Amnesty Lodge had quickly become Amnesty Daycare, what with all the found children scattered around the place. At least it was summer, and they weren’t expected to teach these kids anything. So, for the most part, it was ancient cartoons on the hotel screens and a sensible buffet of kiddie-acceptable foodstuffs with all possible allergens taken out.

And all possible trouble.

They had learned really quickly that, Seeming or no Seeming, young Elves should not have processed sugar. It had taken some warm milk dosed with honey, nutmeg, and a little bit of brandy, some quiet story time, and a decently long afternoon nap to get it out of Lulu and Koko’s systems. Or, as they were known amongst the mere mortals, Luanne and Kody.

So now there was colour-coded wristbands, and stickers on the buffet. Blue for processed sugar. Orange for peanuts. Red for artificial colours and flavourings.

They were  _ all _ learning.

And now it was bath-time, and Dani would not stop laughing. She was in a kaftan, as she had been all day, but Aubrey had insisted on changing into her bathing suit.

Which happened to be an old-school neck-to-knee striped abomination with a completely superfluous peplum skirt.

“Obviously, you have never baby-sat,” said Aubrey. “It’s bath time. You’re gonna need a one-piece bather.”

“Well, you’re the professional, Ms Little; you take on the boys. I’ll take on the girls. They’ll be easier to handle.”

Aubrey snorted, “You know  _ nothing, _ Dani Reese.”

Five girls into the mess, Aubrey saw Dani scuttle, dripping, for her accommodations, only to scuttle back in her stringy bikini. It was a minor miracle and the presence of so much water in the atmosphere that Aubrey didn’t ignite her hair again. Five minutes later, Dani scurried away only to come back after twenty minutes with a full-body wetsuit. And her hair in a tight bun. And her sleeper studs in instead of her usual Hippie Hoops.

Aubrey soothed her afterwards with a hot toddy and some comfort food on the patio.

“They’re monsters… little  _ monsters…” _ Dani sobbed.

“There, now. It’s all right. We got all twenty-eight kids fed, bathed, and in bed.”

“Thirty,” said Dani. “There’s thirty kids including Lulu and Koko.”

Uh oh. “Where are they?”

Sniffle. “They didn’t want to be separated, so I let them use the bathroom in the executive suite.”

_ “Unsupervised?” _ demanded Aubrey.

There is not a font large enough for the  _ oh shit _ that hung in the air between them.

Aubrey took Dani’s hand and took off running for the Executive Suite.

Where two young Elves who had not had running water in their memories had evidently decided to use every bath product and faucet they could reach. If there was any kind of take-away from the resultant scene of foam, colours, and strong scents, it was that these young ones were definitely, without a doubt,  _ clean. _

However, they were going to need quite a while to clean up the mess that the twins had made in the process of getting so sparkly, squeaky clean, because the bathroom was flooded, the hall outside the bathroom looked like that scene in  _ Mister Roberts _ when the steam pipe in the laundry room exploded, and the resultant rainbow foam monster was threatening the bedroom’s upholstery.

They had to be in there somewhere.

“You know the layout best,” Aubrey told Dani. “I’ll do what I can for the bubbles in the bedroom.”

It seemed to take ages, but at the end of it, there were two fluffy, squeaky clean, and adorable little Elves in footie pyjamas… and a  _ lot _ of mopping. And I mean a  _ LOT _ of mopping. An insane amount of mopping. And the application of the wet vac because mopping really wasn’t cutting it so great.

“First rule of babysitting, Dani,” Aubrey lectured. “Never turn your back on the kids.”

“In our defense,” said Lulu, “we didn’t know it was all going to do that.”

“Well, now we’ve all learned something, haven’t we?” said Aubrey. “And we got here in time to stop  _ major _ property damage, so Mama isn’t going to be too ticked off with us. I hope.”

“Come on. Let’s braid up that long hair of yours for beddie-byes,” said Dani. “I know where I am with  _ that.” _

Aubrey busted out the spider brushes and elastics. “Aw come on. You didn’t do too bad for a first day at looking after thirty kids. Just a few little mistakes to grow on. You’re good.” And in the middle of running her fingers through that criminally soft and silky golden hair, she heard something. Soft at first, but growing in volume and timbre.

The twin she was hairstyling was purring.

She caught Dani’s eye and mouthed, “Omigod, they purr!”

Dani mouthed, “It’s so adorable.”

Aubrey mouthed, “Can I keep them?”

And Dani gave her a Look that plainly said,  _ I love you to pieces, you mad goth fire mage, but I am not ready to be a parent yet, especially after today. _

Yeah. Being sudden ersatz moms to thirty kids, two of whom were cryptids to  _ cryptids, _ was not a good start during the first year.


	19. Chapter 19

They had followed the tracks - such as they were - to a road. Lucretia had seen a few techworld roads and this one was not to what she thought of as standard. It was old. Patched. Empty. She’d only seen techworld roads this empty in the middle of the night, and it was only sunset. And worse to her mind, this one was small. Only two lanes. Perhaps, like rivers, techworld roads had tributaries as well.

“Can I help you folks?”

Magnus startled. Lucretia jumped. Standing there, as if he’d sprung up out of nowhere, was one of the Natives. He wore a uniform and had a bulkier version of the techworld’s answer to a Stone of Farspeech. Something the Starblaster, in retrospect, really should have packed. But then, they had never anticipated going so far for so long.

On one hand, he wanted to be helpful. And, as a bonus, he had taken in their IPRE uniforms and not turned a hair. Maybe he thought they were in costume or something.

“Hail and well met,” said Magnus.

“Howdy,” said the native.

Lucretia elbowed Magnus in a  _ shut up _ kind of way and stepped forward. “Hello. My name is Lucretia Clarke, and this is my… friend… Magnus Burnsides.”

“Pleased t’ meet’cha. I’m District Ranger Duck Newton. It’s a nickname.”

Good. Good. Techworlders were less likely to shoot people they knew the names of. This was good. This was fine. “We’re looking for some… other… friends of ours. We’re worried they might have met… strange circumstances.”

“Uhuh,” said Duck.

“They’re… uh… twins? Um. They have a really distinctive appearance?” And this was where it was all going to go south. Rapidly. “Some… might… even call it… alarming? Uh. Uh. They wandered off? Some… time ago?”

Duck started looking nervous. “Folks, we have a hospice situation for all found children in this area up at the Amnesty Lodge,” he said. “I’d advise you to take this up in there, as there have been a few animal attacks in the area. There’s nothing to be alarmed ab--” he trailed off. Looking past them in horror. “Dangit. It’s here. Folks, I’m gonna need you to--”

And then the beast struck.

Once again, it went past both her and Magnus. It even pushed Magnus aside to get to Duck. The beast reached out for him. Trapped him. Started using its horrible magic on him.

Lucretia didn’t think. She drew her own wand just as Duck drew a sword from… a bag of holding? He stabbed with the blade as she fired off one of the heavy hitters Taako had taught her. Evard’s Black Tentacles.

The beast screamed. It was a sound no mortal ears should have heard.

Duck got a few more blows in, slashing and stabbing wildly, and then he was free of its grip. Scrambling away.

“Come on!” Lucretia grabbed one of Duck’s arms. Magnus got the other. All three managed to stagger uphill along the empty road as the beast screamed its unnatural screams behind them.

“Well,” said the sword. “This is an interesting turn of events, DucK. Your new allies are more than they seem.”

That… was not usual for a techworld?

“Cool,” said Magnus. “A talking sword.”

“It ain’t that unusual,” said Duck. “It’s getting it to shut up that’s the miracle.” He shoved it back inside the small bag at his waist. Which was difficult since he was also attempting to hold on to his clothes. “Get me up to th’ Lodge. Somethin’... somethin’s gone wrong.”

A passing street light provided what it might be. Why his clothing was suddenly loose on his frame. Why his boots swam on his feet. And why he had to hold up his pants with one hand.

Duck Newton was a decade and a half younger, now, than he had been mere moments ago.

The sudden change was rough on him, she could tell. The road was long, with many a winding turn. And the beast that struck could be anywhere at all.

Well. Once it got free of the squirming black tentacles that were currently showing it the worst night of its existence. She hoped.

All the same, putting as much distance as she could between the beast and themselves was the best idea.

They did that.

* * *

 

Mama came back to the Amnesty Lodge with every intention of just hauling off to her bed, but there was a definite story to tell here. Barclay, Jake Kulyce and Lupin Garoux were all busy cleaning up a huge amount of mess in the foyer while Aubrey Little and Dani Reese were sharing some companionable wine on the big couch like an old-married couple.

The large map table in the other room was covered with markers, papers, and empty drinking vessels, which meant that there had been another incursion. That map room was closed off with the typical ‘Under Renovations’ sign, which meant that the  _ ski lodge _ had summer guests.

Messy summer guests.

Who were under five feet tall.

Something was rotten in the state of West Virginia.

Mama put her bags down at the reception desk so that they’d be someone else’s problem and loomed over Aubrey and Dani. “I don’t know what in tarnation is goin’ on around here, but y’all better know that I ain’t in any mood for any horseshit.”

“It’s the bom-bom’s fault, not us,” said Aubrey, getting her facts established right off the bat. “It’s been sucking years off of people and turning them into kids.”

“Thirty so far,” said Dani. “If you count the Elves.”

“Elves?” echoed Mama.  _ “Elves? _ I thought Elves were extinct. Both in Silvain  _ and _ this world.”

“So did we,” said Aubrey, “And then Duck turned up with ‘em. You should see ‘em, Mama. They’re so cute... “

“Yeah, I bet they’re cute,” growled Mama. Ominously. Like a fuse burning. “Let me tell y’all about Elves… Elves are wonderful. They provoke wonder. Elves are marvellous. They cause marvels.  Elves are fantastic. They create fantasies. Elves are glamorous. They project glamour. Elves are enchanting. They weave enchantment. Elves are terrific. They beget terror. The thing about words is that meanings can twist just like a snake, and if you want to find snakes look for them behind words that have changed their meaning. No one. Never. Said Elves are  _ nice.” _

Barclay cleared his throat. “You know the old stories as well as I do, Mama. You know half of those stories are told by their enemies.”

“And the other half were told by their own selves. You don’t know which half is which and neither do I.”

“Which is why I decided to play it safe and be kind to these two. Won’t hurt nothin’. Right?”

Mama was losing it. She could see a danger that others were oblivious to and it was getting to her ticker. “Oh sweet Lord, please tell me they do not have  _ parents _ runnin’ around out there. Dangit. I have had a rough fuckin’ time, I do  _ not _ need any more horseshit. Not one apple!”

And then the door to the lodge burst open, revealing two strangers in outlandish uniform and a third who could have been Duck Newton if he had lost twenty pounds and maybe fifteen years. His hat fell off, also revealing a shock of violently blue hair.

The woman of the strangers was quite black and also quite blonde. “He said he could find help here. There was a monster that ate his time…”

“...god damnit, I am getting too old for this,” muttered Mama.

“That could be fixed,” said presumably-Duck, “just walk outside in the dark.”

“Strategy room,” said Mama, clearly on her last nerve. “Now.” She lead the way, with everyone else following her like lost little ducklings.

It was the big, hirsute stranger who balked at the sign. “It says it’s under renovations.”

“Not now, Magnus,” said the young woman through gritted teeth.

They got him in, and on one of the more comfortable seats where he immediately started adjusting his belt. He looked like he’d been through the wringer. Pale and strung out.

“So much for the stealth part of our mission,” sighed the blonde.

Mama took five calming breaths. Took some of her medication. Took a long look at Aubrey in her old-timey swimwear and figured there had to be a story and she didn’t need to know it. “Aubrey. Get your loquacious lapine down here and see if you can fetch up Ned fuckin’ Chicane while you’re at it?”

“Okay,” said Aubrey, already scooting. “You aren’t going to like it.” 

“I am  _ very _ certain he’s got somethin’ to do with this, ‘cause I saw his dang Cyptonomicon advert on  _ Good Mornin’ _ fuckin’  _ America. _ You two,” she singled out the red-apparelled probably-but-not-likely cosplayers. “We’ll get on with introductions when everyone’s down here. Barclay. What the fuck do you mean  _ Elves? _ In  _ my _ fuckin’ lodge?”

“You  _ found _ them?” said the blonde. “We’ve been looking for them for  _ days _ and you  _ found _ them?”

“Er. Duck found them,” said Barclay, pointing at Duck.

“Duck. Since when did you have blue hair?”

Duck, still recovering in the chair, squinted up at a hank of it in his fingers and swore. “Aw,  _ fuck…” _ He, too, took a deep, calming breath, and looked at his hand next. “Seem t’ be skinnier’n I was ten minutes ago… Okay. This,” he pointed at his hair, “happened at about the same time Minerva started making a pest of herself. It’s a chosen one thing. I started dying it black at twenty. ‘Fore then, I could get away with the ‘rebellious teen’ thing… and mah momma wouldn’t let me buy hair dye. Said it broke her heart.” He tried to stand, and fell back into the chair. “Man. I feel like I just did ten rounds with a trash compactor.”

“You just take a load off, there, Duck. We’ll figure this out together. Strangers and all. Barclay?” But Barclay had snuck off. Typical.

Aubrey returned with her bunny and a small child. “Mama? This is Neddy Finster. The bom-bom got him.”

And there was a sleepy, undersized, skinny kid holding Aubrey’s hand. Rubbing at his eyes with his free fist. The resemblance to Ned Chicane was uncanny. And given that Duck was younger, too… Mama sighed and rubbed at an incipient migraine. “I am getting far, far too old for this….”

Aubrey leaned in to her girlfriend, “What’d I miss?” she whispered.

“Duck said the F-bomb,” whispered Dani.

Barclay reappeared with a large tray. Coffee for most, the special tea for Mama, and a big mug of his famous cure-all chicken soup for Duck. He had something red over his shoulder, which Blondie instantly recognised.

“You  _ did _ find them. Are they okay? Wounded?”

“Fast asleep,” said Dani. “They need their rest.”

_ “Aw dang this is a calendar event,” _ chuckled Aubrey, fiddling around with her phone. Which she had also retrieved.

“...w’s goin’ on?” managed Li’l Neddy. He sized up Mama as Someone In Charge. “I dunno what I did, I’m sorry I did it, and if’n you need me t’ cut a switch, I’ll need a knife please ma’am.”

Tempting though it was to flay some skin off of Ned Chicane’s butt… “Naw, sweetie. I just want to ask some questions and then you can head on back to bed. Okay?”

“...’kay.”

Mama dialed up the youtube version of Ned’s advert and showed it to him. “You remember anythin’ about this?”

“Those are the special kids in the ‘xecutive suite. They ain’t allowed sugar.” After a moment’s further thought, he added, “Mister Barclay’s been tellin’ folks they’re his cousins.” He yawned enormously. “Izzat good?”

Mama smiled. No matter how much she wanted to throttle the adult Ned Chicane, this kid knew nothing. “Yeah. You go on back to bed. Know the way?”

Neddy nodded, and shuffled back to that from whence he had come.

“Okay. You,” she pointed out Blondie. “You look like th’ smartest of the two. What’s your story?”

“That,” she indicated the red coat with the cloth patch on it, “belongs to one of our friends. You know what Elves are, it seems so… yes. The twins are Elves. They’re our friends. Our crewmates.”

At that, Mama laid a hand on Blondie’s brow and muttered a spell that should have purged her of any kind of thrall. There was a brief wind that fluffed up her duster and ruffled the papers in the room. “Still your friends?”

“Yes?” said the woman. “What was that?”

“Just makin’ sure they ain’t controllin’ you.”

That earned her some strange looks. “Uh. I’m not sure how Elves operate in this dimension, but in our original one? They just didn’t do that.”

“Maybe we’re safe. Maybe yours don’t know how. Maybe they’re saving it for a special occasion.”

“Great,” muttered Magnus. “An Elfist. Look. I’m sure you’ve got some good reasons, but Lup and Taako wouldn’t hurt anyone unless they had a good reason, okay?”

“They gave their names as Lulu and Koko,” said Barclay.

“Okay, so they got youthed by the monster. The same rule applies. They. Are. Harmless. They’re more likely to be afraid of you than you’re afraid of them. And we’d really like to see our friends, if that’s okay.”

“We need them back,” said the woman, who still hadn’t introduced herself. “The ship isn’t the same without them.”

“Doubt they’d be the same if you did,” said Duck. “They’re about six years old.”

“Yeeks,” said Magnus. “Cap’n’port’s not gonna like this.”

“We can assume procedure has been cast to the wind,” sighed the woman. “My name’s Lucretia Clarke, and I’m what you might call an alien from another dimension. We’re explorers. Or we were. It was supposed to be a two-month excursion to poke at the fabric of the universe, and then our reality got eaten and we’ve been running from reality to reality ever since…” she sighed, wiped her eyes. “This loudmouth with me is Magnus Burnsides. We’re looking for something we call the Light of Creation. We traced it to somewhere in these woods. And if we get it… we can stop the apocalypse happening to your reality.”

“That,” announced Doctor Bonkers, “is quite the bombshell to leave until last.”

Neither of these so-called aliens turned a hair. Further proof for Mama’s mind.

“Okay,” said Lucretia. “Yes. I get it. The apocalypse is big news, but we’ve been dealing with it year after year for way too long. This time, if we get the Light, we’re going to try and taunt the Hunger away from eating your world. We don’t even know if it’ll work… but we have to try it.”

“And y’all need your twins to do that?”

“They are our chief spellcasters,” said Magnus. “Plus if we get the Light early, we could probably figure out something to reverse what’s been happening around here.”

“Early…” echoed Mama. “That means y’all have a time limit.”

Lucretia sighed. “People don’t like hearing this part… Your plane of reality has about eleven months left. Either we find the light and have a chance at saving most of this reality… or we don’t. And everything’s gone.”

“Fate of the world,” sighed Duck. “Typical.”

“And before we get on to that,” said Mama, “I need to see these allegedly friendly Elves.”


	20. Chapter 20

Lucretia came along with the native called Mama. She was, after all, the most distrustful of Elves, and the most xenophobic. How she tolerated all these other disguised species in her lodge was a mystery to be solved at a later date.

How nobody else could see past the glamours and restrictive spells was probably part of it. Then again, Lucretia had spent years studying all sorts of things as a semi-professional student. These people… had not. They probably had no idea what the signs were.

Magnus hadn’t noticed anything. But then, he had failed a perception check for Taako’s ass on his face, that one time. Magnus, Lucretia was certain, would have a hard time noticing a brick wall in front of his face, sometimes.

The executive suites were luxurious by her homeworlds standards. Polished floors. Deep rugs. Soft, padded furniture. Lucretia had learned that this was more-or-less middle of the road for a techworld. Maybe top of the line a decade or so ago. And there, in a darkened bedroom, a knot of tangled limbs and two small heads with pale, braided hair.

Small… human… heads.

It took Lucretia a moment to discern what these natives called a Seeming. A Glamour to cover their appearance and a magical restraint on all their other abilities to make them act and sense things as a human would.

The twins would not appreciate having their senses dulled. But, on the plus side, neither of them were detecting the intrusion. And Lucretia knew that the twins were light sleepers.

“Sure, they  _ look _ innocent enough,” whispered Mama. “Tomorrow will tell, I guess.”

“If we can find a way to restore them, they  _ will _ help you,” Lucretia insisted.

Mama looked… extremely tired. “They’re your crew? They’re your problem.”

The executive suite had more than one bedroom. Magnus let Lucretia take the bed, while he made himself comfy on the ample couch.

The morning was going to be a problem for later, she decided. Tomorrow, she could send a message to the ship, telling her captain that they’d found allies. Conditional allies. He would know what that meant.

And tomorrow came way too soon, with the twins literally in her face, poking at her and everything else in the room. Including her uniform robe.

_ “That is not yours,” _ she said in High Elven.  _ “Good morning, by the way.” _

They faced her. As always, Taako was to Lup’s left, which meant that he was on Lucretia’s right. He was squinting as if trying to remember something. Lup was… just staring.

_ Their names are Lulu and Koko, _ she reminded herself.

They were on her in instants, checking out her wrists, her ankles. Lulu asked, “Are you a real humanman or one of the fakes?”

“I’m human,” she laughed. “I’m a friend.”

Koko was squinting. “You knew us when we were bigger,” he said. “We… worked… together?”

“That’s right,” she said. “We did. And I’m hoping we can work together again.” A brilliant thought occurred. This suite did have a kitchen, after all. “Maybe we could start with pancakes?”

When Mama returned for an inspection, she found a ridiculously domestic scene with two disguised Elves helping both Lucretia and Magnus in the kitchen. And some frankly delicious pancakes as well.

“Awright,” she allowed. “Off with them Seemings, you two. Let’s have a good look at you.”

It was a relief to see them as they should be, even if they were only six years old. Mama’s intense scrutiny made them retreat to Magnus’ lap for security, their ears twitching down, and Koko’s hair curling up in distress.

Lucretia reached out to soothe the poor boy. “You’re frightening them,” she said.

“I frighten them.  _ I _ frighten  _ them.” _ Mama said. “Boy, I tell ya… Havin’ heard what I heard… I ain’t got no good reason to trust ‘em. They’re stories. Legends. And ain’t none of ‘em good.”

“We heard stories about humanmen,” said Lulu from the fortress of Magnus’ arms. “They wanna chop up li’l Elves for dark magic ingredients.”

“Eat their brains so they can live forever,” added Koko.

“They’re just stories, though,” said Lulu. “Real humans aren’t like that.”

“...right?” asked Koko.

“You are in the arms of a humanma--  _ human, _ right now,” said Mama.

“He looks at us like we’re family,” said Koko.

“You look at us like you wanna chop us up,” said Lulu.

“What’d we do that was bad?” asked Koko. “What made you hate us?”

Mama was getting another headache, which was common when the Twins were around, but usually for different reasons. “I don’t-- I try-- Dangit. I’ve never in my life hurt a child and I ain’t plannin’ t’ start. Don’t. Give me cause.”

“...kay?” said Lulu.

“Uhm,” said Koko. “What’s -uh- cause?”

Mama stared. “You… don’t know. Y’all have no idea how your kin-- your kind… hurt the whole world?”

“I’ve told you before,” said Lucretia. “We’re from a different dimension. The things that happened here… aren’t part of their background.”

“I only have your word for that, miss. I’d need some other kind of proof.”

“Do you have Gnomes in this reality?” asked Magnus.


	21. Chapter 21

“This is service above and beyond the call of duty, sir,” said Captain Davenport. “Your commendation will be entered into the logs. Both of you.”

Baby Merle giggled and Dr Hallwinter blushed. Before them was an appreciable spread for seven. Hallwinter toed at the deck. “Turns out that too many cooks  _ do _ spoil the broth. Or… meal. We simply took turns reading and following the instructions, sir.”

Captain Davenport startled at the flares. One green for  _ Hands Coming Home, _ three blue for  _ Allies Incoming. _ “Make ready Hallwinter, Highchurch. We're about to share this feast.”

They lowered the gangplank in time to see Clarke and Burnsides emerge with what appeared to be an adult human and twin little ones. Only his experience with illusions lead him to perceive the second skin after-images around the twins.

Come to think of it, their pale hair and dusky skin seemed  _ awfully _ familiar.

Clarke showed the way, walking up -to them- an invisible ramp. The twins scurried after her, laughing, and the woman felt her way until the illusion wrapped around her and she could see what was really there.

“Okay,” she said. “Okay. That’s one hell of a trick you got th--” Her eyes met his.

Davenport stood to full attention. Jutted his chin a little in an old, old habit.  _ Yes, I am less than four feet tall. Yes, I am in a fancy version of the uniform you see around you. The conclusion you should not be reaching is ‘mascot’. The conclusion you will be reaching is ‘someone in charge’. _

“Hail and well met,” he said. “There’s no need for illusions, here. The entire ship is protected by some intense illusions.”

“You can take your -uh- Seemings off, here,” coached Clarke to the children. “You’re safe.”

It was the eyes that gave it away before they reached for the bracelet clasps. These kids were Lup and Taako.

“You found my crew. Drastically altered, I grant, but you found them. Thank you, Miz…?” he offered a hand in the human way. Any minute now, she would start tripping over her words.

“Folks call me Mama,” said Mama. “Been ridin’ herd on half o’ dang Kepler since I was li--” and there she went. “Young. Don’t want you to think li-- less of us, but we’re usually better at containing the Abominations.” She was staring at Merle. “Why’s that baby got peach fuzz?”

“He’s a Dwarf. It’s perfectly natural.”

Merle grumbled, “...not a baby,” under his breath.

The twins, back to their normal physicality if not their normal age, were all over Davenport like barnacles on an old boat. They were six if they were a day, and -damnit- still taller than him. Still, the hairy eyeball and the clearing of his throat managed to stop Taako from taking a pen right out of his jacket pocket.

“These are obviously special circumstances. We were just about to sit for brunch. Burnsides, take the lead. Hallwinter, escort the twins. Highchurch, with me.”

Lucretia, ever the wallflower, returned to jotting things down in her latest journal.

Davenport could  _ feel _ Mama boggling in his wake. Let her boggle. It would serve to unseat her and perhaps even stop her from ever addressing him as ‘young man’. He might even  _ be _ a young man in comparison to her, but… he was still a  _ Captain. _ Rank had its privileges.

Lup and Taako began following their noses as they got closer to the Mess. Clarke and Burnsides began to smile.

Hallwinter blushed. Tried to become invisible despite being dragged into the lead by the twins.

Good food brought good people together. Taako had always known his food was the perfect cure for any kind of sour mood. Did he remember that now? Or was it lost to whatever had stolen most of his lifetime? Did he recognise his own recipes?

The twins were chanting, “Food, food, food, food…” much to Hallwinter’s amusement.

“Hey, hey, slow down. We don’t eat until everyone sits.”

There were eight for the table, now. And after a decade and change, the eighth chair for the mess table had more or less become a shelf in a corner for any random crap the crew could get to stack. But the quandary of where to put the crap was solved by the twins sharing a single seat.

After so long seeing their regular, well-upholstered forms, it was jarring to see them as skinny little kids who, together, took up the seating space of just one of them.

Davenport took a place at the head of the table. Mama pointedly sat opposite him. Leaders, facing each other for negotiations. Clarke and Hallwinter both hemmed in Highchurch, and Burnsides kept the twins company.

“Food, food, food…” the twins chanted.

“Guests get first pick,” said Davenport. “Mama?”

“Guess I’ll have some o’ that salmon. And that there veggie medley. Thank you.”

The twins held up their empty plate in unison and said, “Sampler, please.” And commenced to spend the entire meal feeding each other. When they weren’t holding hands and using the utensils like ersatz conjoined twins.

Hallwinter was distracted from the normal functions of life by watching them at it. He had his first forkful halfway to his mouth and was openly agog. “This is why,” he was muttering. “This is why the Bond Engine had such a strong response.  _ This _ is why the engine’s so powerful. Cogniscent symbiosis… reaffirming the Bonds formed at birth. Constant re-enforcement of--”

“Hallwinter! Do I have to  _ order _ you to eat your food?”

“Yes,” said Burnsides.

Hallwinter blushed and finally consumed his first mouthful. “Wow,” he said, “This is super-good.”

“You  _ cooked _ it, right?” said Clarke.

“We followed the instructions,” said Highchurch. “It’s amazing how often Barry’s mentioned by name. Well. Sort of his name.”

“It was the twins that did it,” said Clarke. “They took one look at Sildar Hallwinter and renamed him Barry Bluejeans.”

“It’s almost unnatural to hear his real name by now,” said Burnsides. “Cap’n’port does the whole surname thing to everyone except the twins. ‘Cause he can’t.”

Taako visibly drooped. “We… don’t get a family?”

“Of course you do,” said Burnsides. “You’re part of the Starblaster family.” And he reached around to hug them both in one massive arm.

“Touching,” said Davenport. “Now. Mama. The business at hand. You mentioned Abominations? Plural?”

“Every other full moon on the regular since the Gate appeared in Monongahela,” she nodded, cutting up her salmon. “They come out, they hunt, they eat. They get strong. And me and mine have to hunt them down ‘fore the next full moon is done or they’ll run amok through the entire world. It ain’t easy, but it’s better than lettin’ it go.”

“We’re searching for the Light of Creation,” said Davenport. “It came down somewhere in this forest. All our efforts to divine where it is have been foiled. This time… it’s moving.”

The twins oohed and ahed at his illusory, topographical map of the area. Right. Either they didn’t remember their adult lives, or they were mocking him. It was always hard to tell with the twins.

“The light came down here,” the map showed a glowing ball landing in a clearing not far from where he’d parked the ship.

“Fuck me,” said Mama, and the twins erupted into raucous fits of laughter. She ignored them. “That’s practically smack dab on top of the Gate. If it landed during the last full moon…”

“It did,” said Clarke. “I remember.”

“Then this Light of yours and the Abomination of mine could have… merged.”

“What  _ are _ Abominations?” asked Hallwinter.

“Eat as you listen,” murmured Davenport.

Mama explained. Silvain was their linked Plane of Thought, somehow, and there had been cataclysmic events in pre-history resulting from Cryptids coming through to the Material Plane, and humans going through to the Plane of Thought without any kind of protective measures. And somewhere in the middle of it all, the Elves had made a plague of themselves, and in their hubris, got wiped out. They were little more than legends, now. Stories that were full of blood and dark deeds. Stories that had been written over with glitter and sparkles to somehow make it all better. As if children shouldn’t know the truth of death or how to dispose of a monster.

The Abominations didn’t come from Silvain. They didn’t come from the Material Plane. They came from somewhere between the worlds, where none from either side could reach. Some said it was a last curse from the last of the Elves. Some said they were the results of human attempts at magic. In the end, it didn’t matter. Wherever the trilithons sprang up, heroic groups gathered to combat the Abominations. And give shelter to the outcasts of Silvain.

“Believe it or not, the cryptid nonsense Ned Chicane’s got goin’ on in his Cryptonimica is a dang good smokescreen. Can’t tell the horseshit from the honest-to-goodness genuine stuff. Which gives everyone around some plausible deniability.” She took a device from out of her pocket. A techworld communications device. A few deft movements, and one side showed a recorded image.

Blurry and out of focus, of course, but unmistakably the twins. And used to advertise the Cryptonomica in Kepler.

“The good news in all of this is that people are already figuring out how it could be faked,” said Mama. “The bad news is that… the footage exists. Y’all could get hunters comin’ after you.”

“We have this year,” said Hallwinter. “If we have the Light… those hunters will never find us.”

“And if you don’t?” said Mama.

Davenport said it, “This world ends.”

Very softly, almost imperceptibly, the twins began to whine. They started to cry. They had their hands over each other’s mouths. Trying to keep each other quiet.

And for the first time, Davenport had no idea how to handle the situation.


	22. Chapter 22

“I do not appreciate this line of questioning,” said Duck.

“Geez were you  _ always _ forty?” said Aubrey, busily taking notes.

“The process was interrupted,” said Duck. “I reckon my mental faculties may well have been the last to go, if’n it finished its meal.”

“Yeah, but all the others were gone in seconds,” she said. “Maybe it’s that Chosen One invulnerability that messed things up.” Her fingers flew on her keyboard. “Lucretia said how the bombom went past her and Magnus, and it was the second time it picked on someone else rather than her.”

“Awright. So. The targets were older folk. At the times before dawn and after sunset. But we all know that Abominations like to hunt in the dark.”

“If we could find its den…”

“We’ve all been down that road before, Lady Flame. Monongahela is big. Really big. There’s a lot of mountains and valleys and cave systems all up in there. Not to mention good ol’ Ursus Americanus, Canis Lupus, and Lynx Rufus who all tend to view humans as a handy snack. And then there’s  _ you _ running around with your ten-pound talking bait-- no offense.”

“None taken,” said Doctor Bonkers.

“And your innate tendency to set things on fire first and ask questions later.”

“DUCK NEWTON!”

He sighed. “Minerva… please check your gosh-durn batteries or whatever it is you’re using up in there, because I have had a really bad day and I do not want another incident of signal loss.”

“YOU HAVE CHANGED, DUCK NEWTON.”

“Skip to the highlights, thanks?”

“THE TIME IS DRAWING NIGH. THE BEAST HAS FEASTED TOO QUICKLY. YOU MUST JOIN YOUR ALLIES AND PLAN TODAY, OR TOMORROW WILL BE LOST.”

He sat up. “That’s… weirdly clear for you…”

“TIME IS OF THE ESSENCE DUCK NEWTON. YOU MUST JOURNEY NOW TO THE VALLEY OF SEVEN SHADOWS.”

“Aaaannnnd there we go back into the horse pucky. There’s a map right here, Minerva. Just point it out?”

She stayed clear and visible the entire time. “THE SILVER SHIP OF STRANGERS AWAITS YOU HERE, DUCK NEWTON.” And then she was gone. No flickering. Just gone as quickly as she came.

Duck sighed. “Guess rest time’s over. I’d advise keeping Doctor Bonkers somewhere safe. This one sounds like it’s a doozy.”

Doctor Bonkers saw himself into Dani’s arms. “I will be fine right here.”

Duck only paused to change into some better-fitting clothes and help himself to Ned’s gun. “I doubt it would try again, but… weaponry is weaponry.” The pistol went into the fanny pack of holding, and Beacon came out.

By the time  _ that _ happened, they were already on their way to their destination.

“Do I detect a spring in your step, DucK? Some twist of fate or fortune has rejuvenated you. You look well.”

“I’m almost certain it’s temporary,” said Duck. “Don’t get your hopes up.”

“Gonna be fun to explain if it isn’t,” said Aubrey. “Duck’s gone, but his younger cousin wants to join up. He really takes after the original.”

Duck concentrated on the trail for a short time. “You’d be surprised how many people would buy that.”

Aubrey, a stage magician who had doubtlessly experimented with hypnotism, said, “No I wouldn’t.”

The woods were silent, and not dark, but they were deep. And every rustle of the bushes had them on edge.

Aubrey broke first. “So… I heard you said the F-bomb. Any chance of a replay?”

“The mighty hero uttered a  _ curse?” _ said Beacon. “That  _ is _ a rarity. Which one of the abominable words did DucK chance to utter?”

“I wasn’t there for it,” said Aubrey, “But Dani heard him say the F-word.”

“A choice curse, DucK, but not the one you need to fear.”

“I’m still playing it safe, no matter what,” murmured Duck, “If the Abomination is getting stronger, it could be hunting by daylight. We need to keep our minds on the job, not go goofing about in regards to my general lexicon.”

“Oooh, is that why you don’t curse?” said Aubrey, picking up on a topic that Duck clearly did not wish to cover. “What’s supposed to happen? Lightning? Earthquakes? Lightning and earthquakes?”

“Krakatoa-level volcanic eruption,” said Duck. “Now can you please stop talkin’ about it?”

Aubrey bleated. “Hahaha… that was a good joke.” And when Duck failed to agree, she said, “That  _ was _ a joke. Right?” Further silence. “Right?”

Duck kept on walking, keeping a brisk pace. Saying nothing.

The warm, midday air was still. Only periodically punctuated by Aubrey’s increasingly worried, “...right?”s.


	23. Chapter 23

Barry was a slow eater whenever he had a notebook on hand. And he was slow now. Working on a mathematical/social formulae and a topographical map of the entire Monongahela area. He would periodically attempt to eat with his pencil, or his wand, instead of his fork. One or the other of the grown members of the crew occasionally spoke to say, “Eat, Barold.” 

Something that the twins joined in with for the fun of it. Usually when he had a pencil or his wand in his hand. Because that was when he was at his funniest eating attempts.

Mama had to be a believer. She’d been fighting the good fight since the Eighties, when she wandered into Silvain by accident and got drafted to help out with everything else. But all this stuff about magic Elves from another reality and the thing they called the Hunger? Well. That was just one big Abomination when you got down to it. It had gotten away before these folks were even enlisted in the fight. They were on Defense and it was a hard thing to win when a team was on Defense.

There was only one thing that stuck in her metaphorical craw.

“Y’all have been doing this for  _ how _ many years, and none of you age?”

“You believe the talking bunny. You believe the Elves. You believe the youthification monster…”

“Magnus, for the last time, we’re not calling it that,” said Lucretia.

“But the annual reset for us is where you draw the line?”

Mama rubbed her face. “Welp. Here’s the thing. It’s usually your vampire that’s been whatever age for however long. That’s one of the few Silvans we keep a sharp eye on. Now I can tell that all o’ y’all ain’t vampires. And the only immortals ‘round here might be the Elves.”

“Elves live to around seven hundred and fifty,” supplied Magnus. “They’re not immortal. And our two were only a hundred and forty-six.”

“Still very young,” said Davenport. “Fresh-faced kids, if you will. But genius levels of brilliance.”

Barry almost didn’t notice when a squirming weight invaded his lap. He was too into his equations and hardly paying attention to the conversations around him. And then there was a head in-between him and his work. He startled and realised that he had a six-year-old Lup in his lap. Lulu, now.

“This is the fifth time you’ve nearly stabbed yourself in the eye because of trying to eat with a wand,” she said. “You need dove-spoons.”

Koko had retreated to the relative safety of Magnus’ arms, but was still watching with a twinkle in his eyes and a giggle in his throat.

“I do know how to feed myself, Lulu.”

“No you don’t,” she said, hefting a spoon full of something he knew was delicious. “Here comes the dove looking for her nest,” she said, and cooed in a remarkably accurate impersonation.

The really mortifying part was that Lup had done this to him when they were both adults, too. Making him eat as he worked. The only thing missing was the unadulterated snark that used to come with such feeding methods.

Barry kept working. Obediently opening his mouth at every dovelike coo. Ignoring the chuckles and giggles from all around him.

“I got it,” he said. A flick of his wand, and the map’s areas dwindled down into five, easily-searchable zones. “Numermancy doesn’t lie. These are the areas where it’s most likely that the beast would be hiding.”

Lulu made another coo, loaded spoon in hand.

He chuckled and said, “Thank you, dear,” and took up it and the plate of the dish she had been feeding him. “Lady Mama? If you can get your crew to our ship, we can work together to eliminate the beast, and capture the Light… given the unique energy signatures, we are -haha- killing two birds with one stone.”

Mama had long since explored the ship and was now making ready to leave. “It’s gonna be hard,” she said. “This place is so out of the way, I doubt anyone’d find it even if you didn’t make it invisible.”

And just as she said that, just as she set foot on the gangplank, there was the youthified Duck Newton and Aubrey Little. The former with his talking whipsword. The latter without her talking rabbit.

* * *

 

The Pine Guard -or what remained of it- assembled on a silver ship more suited for the seven seas than the uncharted realms of multidimensional space. Koko, Lulu, and baby Merle all remembered their encounter with the Beast when they saw a picture of it, and it was their testimony that unlocked the secret of the Beast’s prey.

The more years someone experienced, the tastier they were to the Beast.

“Telomeric decay,” said Barry Bluejeans in the middle of that discussion. “It hunts by sniffing out -sensing, somehow- the telomere chain decay of an organism. That’s why it went for the twins. They’re a hundred and forty-three. A double feast.”

“It went for Lup first,” said the youthified Taako. “I tried to get in its way, but it just shoved me aside and ate all her years away.”

“I couldn’t stop it,” said Lulu. “It hurt to cast spells. And then… I felt sick and worn out.”

Baby Merle said, “I didn’t even have time for a prayer… It was on me in seconds. Less than seconds. But it ignored the humans.”

“Merle started out at two hundred and seventy-five. That’s like a banquet. Plus, he’s past middle-aged for a Dwarf, so that would make him even more attractive as a victim. The older someone is…” he trailed off. Glanced at Mama, and then said, “I could plausibly be bait?”

Mama’s smile was grim and humourless. “Thank’ee kindly, young man, but this ain’t my first rodeo, nor the first time I’ve been the honey trap. Hell. The only person older than me in here is Barclay.”

“I’ll do it,” said Barclay. “You should be concealed in safety.”

“I ain’t gonna live forever, sweetheart. We both know this.”

It was a rare moment of tenderness for him to say, “I know… but I’d rather you didn’t break on us so soon.”

“Fine,” she sighed, “I’ll warm the bench this time.”

Davenport, standing on a chair, noticed this. Noticed that he and his crew had something to teach this band of misfits. Something that Mama, especially, needed to know. He waited diplomatically for most of the teams to leave. Or at least journey out of the room to plan their search patterns and attacks.

“They also serve who stand and wait,” he said.

Mama examined him with her eyes. “You pushin’ to get me to retire too? I ain't dead yet, mister.”

“Captain,” he corrected. “The youngest Captain of any species on my planet. Many don't respect me because of my height. Many more don’t respect me because of my youth. And yet, here I am. Captain of the first mission of its kind, in command of people many times my age. Many times my height.”

“I’m not seeing your point…” said Mama.

“You think I did anything like that by risking my life and hovering at my crew’s elbows?”

“They don't know how to do nothin’ proper,” objected Mama. “They're making mistakes left right and centre, and I don't wanna think about all the consequences I been holdin’ off...”

“Have you been teaching them about all of this information?”

Now she found the decking to be intensely fascinating. “...no…”

“Best to start now, don't you think? Get your crew prepared for the troubles you know. Map the waters ahead.”

She was weighing him up with her eyes now. Finding some worth in his words. “Are all o’ y’all kind this dang clever?”

“Most become gardeners or goldsmiths. Traditional roles. I… happen to be non-standard.”

“Care to tell me how to command when I'm used to doin’ it all by myself?”

Davenport thought about this. How to boil a lifetime’s experience down to a beginner's understanding and an easily-memorable philosophy. “Know your crew. Know their strengths and weaknesses. They are going to be your hands in your stead. So know them as you know your hands. Trust them to perform well in their strengths. Train them and help them conquer their weaknesses. And most importantly, make certain that they know what's at stake, and that you trust them to do their best. The hardest thing to do is step back and trust.”

Mama whistled backwards. “Gonna get white knuckles clinging to that rail, the first time.”

“Always the way it goes,” he said. “You pretend you're not grinding your teeth to stumps and they pretend that they don't know you're anxious. It gets easier.”

Mama took a deep breath. He knew that one. The _I can do this even though I’m pretty sure I’ll fuck it up,_  breath. “Welp. I guess I gotta go out and squeeze the railin’. Care to join me?”

“It would be an honour.”


	24. Chapter 24

The light was fading. Duck had loaned Ned’s gun to Barry Bluejeans. Or was it SIldar Hallwinter? He had a face that could have stepped out of the steppes of Russia, but a demeanor like anybody’s next-door neighbour with a side of absent-minded professor.

Most worrying was the fact that the twin Elves had invited themselves along and Barry hadn’t even tried to stop them.

All three of these alien beings were taking it seriously, though Duck doubted how serious anyone could be with a wooden stick as one’s only weapon. Okay. Maybe a wooden stick with a rock in it. And he was dimly aware that he, wielder of Beacon, endlessly talking whipsword of destiny, should not be one to criticise.

But…

Sticks. With rocks in them.

Do whatever you liked to their appearance. Carve them, turn them, add whatever embellishments you will. Tell him that they were such-and-such wood with blah-blah crystals, each grown in certain circumstances, and treated with whatnot under the light of the gibbous moon during the festival of fancy-pants… it was all pure horse puckies. All their wands were were sticks with rocks in them. Even when he’d seen what they could do with them.

“Barold. Lulu’s forgetting when we were bigger again,” complained Koko. Or Taako. Elves apparently chose their names when they came of age.

On their one-hundredth birthday.

Barry summoned the illusion, and said, “Remember?” and winced at the kids’ terrified faces. He loved these people, and he didn’t want to cause them even the most fleeting moment of abject terror… but it was a necessary evil. To remember their lives, they had to see the Beast.

Duck said, “Taako can remember his adult life better than his sister. I can remember better’n either of ‘em. You reckon it was because the Beast was interrupted? Maybe it eats memory, too?”

“This is what you get,” said the youthified Taako. “This is what happens to you for lording it over me for the forty-five minutes that you’re older. You get your brain scrambled, Lup. Scrambled, and fried up way hotter than it should be cooked, so it’s full of charcoal and  _ inedible.” _

“You wanna eat my brain?” she said, “Or ruin it so that nobody can eat it?”

“Okay, so the metaphor got away from me…”

“Shoosh, you two,” said Barry. “We’re nearing another potential den.”

Lup sniffed. “It’s empty,” she said. “But not cold…”

Just like the others.

And just like the others, it had these weird pods in them. Forty-five inches in diameter. Black, but not the oozing, glistening black of a regular Abomination. It was a solid black. A living black, like the darkness of a raven’s feathers, or a penguin’s.

Beacon didn’t recognise them as a threat, and therefore they could be left to deal with at a later date. Barry already wanted to take one back to the Starblaster for analysis and examination. Which would also wait until a later date.

The rainbow-coded walkie crackled into life. Almost scaring the beans out of all of them. “...uck… is Aubr… ound ano… bunch o… ack bal… o sig… ombom. Over.”

They must be on the edge of a dead zone. But he still got most of it. “Roger that, Lady flame. We just struck out at Site Twelve. Converge on Site Thirteen. Over.”

“..ite thirtee… ot it. See yo… ere. Out”

“This is the last site there is,” said Duck. “It has to be there. Stay quiet, everyone. We should be able to take it by surprise.”

At least, he hoped that was the way it would go. Every Abomination was different. For all that they had similar habits, they had different sensory profiles, different means of attack. Different ways of messing up a perfectly good plan of attack and leaving someone with some injuries to explain.

Lady Flame had Barclay for bait, Magnus and Ned’s gun for protection, Lucretia for magic, as well as her good self. Between him and his, and her lot, they may well be able to deal with the monster quickly. Maybe. If they only got out of it with minor injuries, Duck figured he was ahead of the game.

Even Beacon was silent as they approached the last potential site. Something Duck was intensely grateful for. This was the last one. If Barry’s math was correct. And he hoped it was.

Site thirteen. Unlucky for some. He hoped and prayed that it would be unlucky for the Beast.

The twins almost seemed to melt into the underbrush. It seemed ridiculous, given their jackdaw taste in clothing and golden hair, but they blended so well that it took him conscious effort to not accidentally step on them.

Barry almost followed into their invisibility. The Elves had taught him some of their tricks, but others did not take. Like… how to make a brilliantly crimson robe blend in with the greens and browns of the woods.

They halted on the edge of a clearing near one of the large pits that Barry had selected as a likely den. Conspiracy theorists liked to posit that it was the entrance to a secret viking/templar/illuminati labyrinth that lead to a bunch of treasure when in reality it was a construction for some Z-grade movie that had never been cleaned up. The set designer had invested way too much effort in it, and it had stayed there. And was now occasionally a haven for hibernating bears.

What it was now was a den for the Beast.

Duck watched in silence, as did the others, as the Beast approached this den, entered, and made some unnervingly wet sounds for a span of minutes before emerging again.

“NOW!” said Minerva, manifesting to block the Beast’s way out.

Magnus used Ned’s gun at the same time that Lady Flame shot a spurt of fire at it. Barry said something that ran pure chills down Duck’s back and Taako…

Taako shouted, “Abra-ca- _ fuck you!” _ and the ground the beast stood on was enveloped in milky tentacles.

Lup threw fireballs at it, in much the same way that Lady Flame did.

Lucretia’s spells were more protective, casting shields around whichever one of them appeared to be in the most danger from the Beast, which did not know which way to turn. “It has the Light,” she cried. “This creature has the Light.”

Barry’s words changed, and now the Beast seemed to be melting. There were the bones of a deer in there, no doubt the first creature that the Abomination was able to possess, and this magic seemed to be stripping the burning darkness off it.

And inside the ribcage was…

Light.

A bright and beautiful light that, despite its brilliance, would not hurt to look at it. It was beautiful. Duck knew without asking that it was an impossible treasure. He even forgot about ending the Beast, and began just trying to hack it free so he could have it for himself.

If Beacon had anything to say about this change, he didn’t hear a word of it.

A shield thwarted him. Reduced his need for it. Brought him back to himself.

Lady Flame’s hands were still alight. Waving in front of his face.

“Ma’am, Miss... I’m gonna need you to extinguish those flames,” he said.

“He’s back,” she laughed.

“That was most alarming, DucK,” said Beacon.

Duck shoved the whipsword back into his magical fanny pack, lest it begin to wax lyrical again.

Taako nudged Lup, who also had hands that were on fire. “Lulu. Lup. Lupedy-lu. You have a twin.”

She punched him. “I’ve had one since birth, dingus.”

“Technically speaking, you didn’t have one for forty-five minutes. As you  _ so _ frequently remind me.” They started tousling. Tumbling around on the forest floor and giggling as they did so.

Magnus got himself between Duck and the shielded Light. “You do understand how dangerous this is, don’t you? That we have to protect the world from its influence.”

Duck still wanted to touch it. Guard it from… whatever wanted to take it from him. Hoard it like a miser. And then his true nature came back to the fore. “I don’t want any more magic to mess up my life, so y’all make sure that’s well out of anyone’s way.”

“DUCK NEWTON,” said Minerva, now between him and the entrance to the hide-away. “WHAT YOU FIND HERE MAY REPAIR THE INJURY DONE TO THIS WORLD. TAKE ALL CAUTION AND KNOW ALL BEFORE YOU DECIDE THE FATE OF INNOC--” and then she was gone.

Duck sighed, “I’m gettin’ real tired of that.”

The twins, meanwhile, had given off their roughhousing because of a discovery in the den.

“Gro-o-o-oss… this one’s all wet. And warm.”

“Euw, it’s sticky.”

“Lulu… Lulu smell it. Smell it! Tell me if I’m crazy.”

Duck came up to the entrance of the drystone cabin/cavern/shelter, watching the twins as they sniffed at the newest egg/spheroid/deposit… thing. There had been some significant debate as to what possible biological process was being imitated with them.

Lup/Lulu sat rather heavily. Stared at her brother. “It… It smells like…”

“Family?”

“Yeah. Like… a cousin or something.” Sniff, sniff. “Four times removed.”

Barry followed them down and picked up one up. Squinted at it. “This,” he said quietly, “is a sphere of intense generative force. Creation on a massive scale. The Abominations were a force of death incarnate… like… a smaller form of the Hunger, and without rational thought. This,” he juggled the sphere. “This is almost the complete opposite. I need to examine this. All of these. Figure out what the Light and this Beast were doing together.”

One of the orbs, far to the back of the den, wriggled, just slightly.

“We need to take these to Mama,” Duck decided.


	25. Chapter 25

Merle was a quiet child. Mama was grateful for it. He had only made his presence known towards the end of her vigil, and that was when it was his bedtime.

“Miss Baker reads to me,” he had said, holding a tome. “But she isn’t here. Can you...? Please?”

Well. Her hands were getting sore from gripping the railing. She made herself let go. Looked to the little Captain.

He had a much lighter grasp of the railing. “I’ll keep watch and call you if I see anything.”

Mama mumbled her thanks and followed Merle to the big bean bag thing in the rec room that looked like it could hold a family slumber party.  _ A family of seven. _ Plenty more than enough room for her big butt and Merle’s impossibly tiny one.

It was weird seeing a weedy growth of moustache and beard on a five-year-old, but it was also weird talking to a man with a goat’s head. Or someone in confident command who also happened to be under four feet tall. Weird was her life.

So she got comfy on the gigantic bean bag thing and opened up the book.

It was a mission log. Selected because of the pictures.

Mama read of the crew’s adventures in a world somewhere between the fantasy realms they were used to and the technological realm Mama knew. Usually, magic and technology didn’t mix well, but this one… this one had them merge in interesting ways.

She was reading softly and quietly about some extraordinary shenanigans Magnus got messed up with when two extra bodies joined the pile. Merle murmured in his half-doze as the twins cuddled in.

“See, Lulu? That’s us when we were big.I had the French braid and you had the Dutch braid. We found this awesome fruit, it like, glowed but only during twilight? And I made this amazing sunset sorbet out of it. Remember?”

“Stop making stuff up, Koko.”

Koko sighed. Snuggled down. Mumbled, “I don’ wanna forget. It was amazing.”

Lulu lounged around Merle so she could hold Mama’s arm. “What was the food like?”

“I was just up to that part,” she said. And read, “Of course the twins, Lup and Taako went straight for the food markets. Taako is always looking for new flavours to tempt us with and Lup says she’s looking for a world in which garlic does not exist…”

Lulu giggled sleepily. “I like her.”

“She gets to be a pain in the ass,” mumbled Koko.

“The twins found a marvellous fruit,” read Mama, as the youthified aliens snuggled around her. “It possesses a natural luminescence…”

* * *

 

Barclay, Barry, Dani and Davenport were all being nerds together. Which, though it was a sight to behold according to Aubrey, was starting to get dull. She leaned over the assorted analysis equipment and her girlfriend and whispered, “I’m gonna head back to the Lodge, okay? Make sure the pack has the kids sorted, and I kinda need my zees.”

“You go on,” said Dani. “I’ll be running on nerditry and coffee ‘till you get back.”

They kissed and Aubrey left. There would be little in the woods, now, to threaten her. Not with half the pack patrolling the forest and the Beast done with for another pair of months.

Dani got out her cards now that Aubrey was gone. They were her most reliable means of divination, when there wasn’t a certain magician around to stack the deck. She loved Aubrey, she did, but never trust anyone who knows prestidigitation with a deck of cards. Even tarot cards.

Death came out first. Inverted. Dani laid down the spread, reading for this egg, and all the others connected to it.

“A great change,” she said. “A restoration of what was once lost. A chance at redemption.”

“Pardon me, but I could get that much horse pucky out of Minerva,” said Duck.

Barry and Davenport were weaving spell structures together. Passive ones that would not interfere with the egg, or whatever it was. Things that would render the night-black shell transparent. Things that would help divine the purpose.

This was something new.

For all of them.

“Got it,” muttered Davenport.

The shell seemed to dissolve, but it was merely an illusion. This had been the pod that had twitched. One of the older ones.

Inside was a sight to behold. Two tiny figures, barely recognisable as humanoid, floating serenely in a clear-ish fluid. Supported by something that was… not quite yolk. Not quite placenta.

They were not human infants.

They had pointed ears forming.

“Those are baby Elves,” whispered Barclay. “And… they’re  _ Drow.” _

Duck looked up at him. “We have to tell Vincent. We gotta gather all them eggs. Make a decision.”

“And save the world,” added Dani. “And figure out how to reverse the youthifying. We… do have thirty-one kids who used to be adults.”

“Nobody wants to explain that many kids with that many disjointed memories,” murmured Duck. “Or the missing adults.”

“If Ned were here, he’d probably cook up something about the fountain of youth,” said Barclay.

Barry tweaked the diagnostic spell, adjusting one of the forms. “There’s a siphon… these eggs are still taking time from the victims… I think… if we bond the siphoned time to something…  _ much _ older… I’d need to test it on Merle. Make certain the shock won’t hurt anyone.”

Davenport looked him in the eye. “How will you choose a twin if it fails?”

Barry looked briefly devastated. “I’ll try not to fail…”

“What are you  _ talking _ about?” demanded Dani.

Davenport sighed. “Every year. Every world. Every  _ reality _ we visit… when we arrive? We reset to the day we left our home realm. Everyone on the Starblaster has died at least twice.”

Barry said, “We are, for want of a better term, expendable. Though we’d all prefer not to be expended.” He took a deep breath. Made a long sigh. “I need to work on the math.”


	26. Chapter 26

Magnus woke at dawn. Something for which most of the Starblaster crew yelled at him for. There were nerds sleeping on handy surfaces in the map room. Barry was underneath the table after evidently attempting a new form of Numermancy involving temporal mechanics. Magnus knew better than to disturb any of the chalk. Newcomers Barclay and Dani had made themselves comfortable in some likely chairs and Cap’n’port had simply laid down on a counter and taken forty winks or more.

Magnus tip-toed past them and into the rec room, where Mama laid on the big bean bag with Merle and the twins.

It was the cutest thing he had ever seen.

Mama had passed out with the twins on either side of her, and Merle tucked in between herself and possibly-Lup. It was harder to tell the twins apart when they were (a) pre-puberty, (b) fast asleep, and (c) in identical clothing. The twins had interlaced one hand each over Mama’s middle and were taking turns at purring.

Magnus put both hands over his mouth to stop the squeal of joy, and tip-toed at top speed up the stairs and to Lucretia’s quarters.

“Luce,” he whispered as he crept inside. “Lu-u-uce… Lucy…”

The shape under her sheets went, “F’goff ’m sleep’n…”

“Luce. Luce. Loosy goosy… C’mon. I gotta get a record of this.”

The shape moved. “M’gn’s I swear t’ th’ gods, ‘f this ‘s ‘noth’r dog…”

“It’s even better. Grab your stuff. C’mon.”

Lucretia was the only ship-member who still wore the uniform nightwear. A cream-coloured nightgown that was theoretically one-size-fits-all. She had pulled all the drawstrings out except for the one that closed it up at the neck. “...’s bet’r be good,” she grumped, reaching for this year’s journal and her go-bag of art supplies.

Magnus cautioned her to be silent as they headed back down.

They were still out of it. He pointed her towards them and whispered, “Look. Aren’t they adorable?”

Lucretia scrunched up her eyes so that she could open them. “Aaawwww…” And with a well-practiced motion, flipped open her journal and started documenting.

Magnus, unable to contain any squees of glee, adjourned to the kitchen to get the _big_ pot of coffee on. Of course, following Taako’s I’d-better-be-dead recipe book for the complete process.

How many times had Barry burned water for his name to get mentioned so often in this dang book?

Magnus had been cautioned not to read ahead and get the recipes mixed up. A caution he no longer needed, owing to reading it through so very, very often. Though he did have to wonder how often Lucretia got distracted by moments in time that she messed up cooking times by trying to capture instants, and spending hours on it so that the food burned.

Everyone had their flaws, he guessed. Taako put too much garlic in everything and Lup was practically addicted to hot sauce. So much so that she had a treasured recipe for the stuff from one of the weirder realities they’d visited called  _ Wow-Wow Sauce. _ Just one drop of it had made Magnus spend the rest of the year living off of cream, and Lup started drinking it, neat, from the bottle.

He never messed with her after that year. Lup was a force of nature, and you just don’t  _ mess _ with forces of nature.

And, by extension, Taako was sacrosanct, too. Anyone who messed with Taako got exactly what they deserved. In duplicate, because Taako was capable of surgical precision with his heavy-hitter spells.

But not right now…

Magnus concentrated on the coffee. Not daring to daydream about getting some retroactive revenge against a couple of six-year-old Elves who probably couldn’t even remember the pranks they’d pulled on Magnus when they were adults.

And when he put it that way…

Getting revenge on them at all was a bad idea.

“Coffee…” said a voice by his knee. Cap’n’port was nominally awake, and he’d smelled the beans.

“Two more minutes,” said Magnus, pulling out the chair for him. “Would you like a pancake while you wait?”

“Coffee.”

Okay. Cap’n’port was at that stage in his morning where he was monoverbal and had only one goal. Magnus warmed up one of the successful breakfast muffins in the fantasy toaster-oven anyway.

Barclay was the next to stumble into the mess, drawn by his nose. “Oh, man, that coffee smells  _ good…” _

“One more minute,” insisted Magnus. “Pancake? Muffin?”

“I’m an eggs and bacon kind’a guy. Thanks though.”

Lucretia sidled in, grinning her face off. “I got it without waking any of them up,” she squeaked. “Several angles.”

“Aaaawwwww…” said Barclay. “They’re all so adorable when they’re asleep. Even Mama.”

Magnus peeked. They were too precious. “Sure we can’t keep ‘em like that Cap’n’port?”

“Coffee.”

Magnus was finally able to pour it, having heard the timer ding. “Cream? Milk? Almond milk? Honey?”

“Coffee.” Cap’n’port took a sip. Came alive by slow degrees. “What nonsense have you been up to before I woke?”

Lucretia showed him her pictures.

Sip. “That’s disgustingly cute,” he pronounced. “I trust you’re not going to use this to blackmail your crewmates…”

During the pause, there was a moment in which Magnus and Lucretia exchanged a nervous look. This had been exactly what they were planning. Once again, their captain’s reputation for telepathy was re-enforced.

Cap’n’port took another sip. “...more than necessary,” he added.

Grins all around. Even Barclay, busy cooking himself some bacon and eggs, got the joke.

“Troublemakers, are they?” he asked from the stove.

“They have a hundred years of experience on everyone in the ship except Merle,” complained Lucretia. “Or close enough to a hundred years that it doesn’t matter.”

“Had,” corrected Magnus. “They’re little kids, now. Adorable little kids. We can’t really get revenge on ‘em until they’re grownups again. It wouldn’t be fair.”

Lucretia sighed. “Fine. But only if they’re not little assholes.”

Dani was next to enter the mess, mumbling, “Coffee…” in a croaking voice. Once she had slugged half a mug she sighed, “How can one old dude be so fanatical about all-nighters?”

Magnus started paging through the cookbook. “Barry had an all-nighter? I’d better get onto the brain food…”

“Barclay James Tierni, y’all better’ve made some o’ them eggs and bacon for me,” grumbled Mama.

“How did you escape the twins?” boggled Lucretia.

“Didn’t.” Mama pulled up the skirts of her duster to reveal the twins. Curled up around each calf and still ninety-eight percent asleep.

Lucretia made a small choking noise and began drawing again.


	27. Chapter 27

Duck had begged off of work, claiming a mystery cold that had struck like a wildcat. He could not turn up as a blue-haired twenty-something without having to answer awkward questions. He had Aubrey get him some spare black hair dye, but being half his actual age would get Noticed. Duck had been successfully avoiding Notice since eighteen years of age. Some would accuse him of having an avoidant personality, but he tended to walk away from those folks.

Just like he was spending time away from the public eye, today. Deep in the least accessible parts of Monongahela. Right about where these extra-dimensional aliens had their invisible silver ship parked.

It was an odd frame of mind that made him pull out Beacon from its hiding space and actually consult it.

“Awright,” he said. “I know you have kind’a… a way of being in contact with the future or destiny or whatnot. Can you give me the clear skinny that Minerva can’t?”

“A storm approaches,” said the whipsword. “A hunger is coming that will never be sated. It seeks to devour the light, but seven birds will fly it away and save most of our existence.”

He sighed. “I’ll take that as a ‘no’.”

“It is the nature of destiny to be obscure, DucK. If we could read ahead in the book of life, we would change the narrative.”

Duck found a handy rock to sit on so he could stand Beacon on its point and look it square in the pommel (yeah, it has an eye). “You know. It’s horse pucky like this that had me runnin’ from my destiny for twenty-odd years.”

“I am well aware, DucK,” said Beacon. “The problem is that the future is not direct.”

Movement in the shrubbery made Duck whip his whipsword behind his back and stand. There, emerging from the undergrowth, was a very average-looking human. Average age, average height, average hair… there was nothing at all memorable about them apart from the printed chestplate on their T-shirt.

“Uh, sir, you’re going to have to head on back to the hiking trail,” he said. “We’ve -uh- had some reports of a rabid bear in this area, I am stationed here for observation and the safety and wellbeing of park visitors like yourself. Now if you head on downhill to the west--”

The nondescript man laughed. “Ah the rabid bear story,” he said, and the  _ instant _ he said that, Duck recognised him. “That brings me back.”

“Vincent?” Duck boggled, bringing Beacon back out into the open. “I didn’t recognise you with that face on.”

“It is, indeed, your ally from the other world, DucK,” said Beacon. “You should use my eye for the sight of truth, as was foretold by--”

Duck shoved his weapon into the fanny pack of holding. “Yeah, sorry about that, I still haven’t figured out how to shut it up.”

“You seem a little… different.”

“Run-in with the abomination, this moon,” explained Duck. “Sucked a good fifteen years or so off’a my tally.” He briefly flicked aside his hat, showing off the blue hair. “And ruined my dye job.”

Vincent briefly boggled. “I’m here to see…  _ them,” _ he said.

Right. Some members of Sylvain couldn’t even say the word ‘elf’ for fear of invoking… something. Duck lead Vincent over to the invisible gangplank and tapped his foot on it. “Once you have both feet on it, you’ll see the whole thing,” he informed.

Vincent hesitated. “I’d… I’d appreciate having you and your weapon nearby.” A pause while he considered the path before him. “Please?”

“Sure thing.” Duck didn’t get it. Sure, there were some hinky stories about Elves, but… the twins were nothing like the stories. If they could be accused of anything, it was of being isolated from the modern era as Duck knew it, and otherwise, they seemed like ordinary, everyday kids.

Case in point, they were currently in the ship’s mess, eating pancakes that were dripping with honey, and also they were thoroughly sticky with it. Hands and face together. Lucretia and Dani alike were trying to braid the twins’ golden hair away from their faces before the stickiness reached places that would be too troublesome to clean. While the twins were busy attempting to eat as many pancakes as Elvenly possible, as quickly as possible, and watching out for anyone attempting to take said pancakes away.

They reacted to Vincent by stuffing their mouths dangerously full and covering their lips with both hands.

Mama, calmly eating a breakfast, nodded to him and said, “Vincent. Mornin’.”

One of the twins, gulping down their pancakes, said, “You’re allowed to take your Seeming off. It’s safe here.”

Vincent boggled at them. At their ears. At their slit-pupil eyes. At the golden freckles on their cheeks. He took off his Seeming and one twin grinned. And came out with a chain of grunts, chirps, and squeaks that sounded almost like a language.

“What the heck, Koko?” said the other twin.

“It’s the animal talk. From when we were bigger and after--” Koko tutted and sighed. “Nevermind. You don’t remember.”

Vincent swore he’d missed something. “I beg your pardon?”

“The abomination ate their age,” said Dani. “Before this happened? They were  _ only _ one hundred and forty-six.”

“Elves live to about seven hundred and fifty,” said one of the humans in the room. The big, muscular fellow in a red jacket. “So they were still pretty much kids like me.”

“Very young,” said the dark-skinned one with impossibly blonde hair. “For Elves.”

The other twin started licking their hands.

“Lulu, that’s gross,” chided a small being that Vincent was unfamiliar with. Another living legend, according to the reports. A Gnome. He wore a more ornate version of the coat that the young human wore. Their captain?

“Tastes nice,” said Lulu.

Dani was ready with a washcloth. “Honestly. Did nobody feed you two?”

The twins looked at each other and shrugged. “Times are rough,” said Lulu. “Food’s not cheap.”

“This place is cool,” said Koko. “There’s food  _ everywhere.” _

“Seen enough?” asked Duck. He’d put the sword away earlier, knowing he wouldn’t need it. “They’re just like regular kids.”

Regular kids who would take a century to be considered mature. Regular kids who had once  _ been _ mature, and were now kids again thanks to an abomination that acted like the fountain of youth.

“Yeah,” managed Vincent. “And the eggs?”

“Rounded up most of ‘em. Got another sortie headed out to get the rest today,” said Duck. “There’s one bein’ studied in the map room.”


	28. Chapter 28

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Has to be a short one today because the next instalment's pretty long.

It wasn’t the first time that Barry woke up with a goat peering down at him. It was the first that the goat appeared concerned and spoke in Common. “Are you all right, there, sir?”

“I almost had it,” Barry mumbled. Ouch. The floor wasn’t nearly as comfortable as it had been after uncounted hours hunched over spell forms in the middle of the night. The blue-haired blur in the distance wasn’t anyone he knew. “Where’re m’ glasses?”

“Are these them?”

Familiar frames threw the world into focus. Yes, that was a humanoid figure with the head and hindquarters of a goat. And yes, that was Duck Newton in the background.

“Thanks,” said Barry, levering himself up off the deck. “I swear I only closed my eyes for a minute…” It was painful to move. Even more painful, still, to remain motionless. Ugh. The kinks in his muscles had kinks in their muscles. “...’f I didn’t reset every year, I’d swear I was getting too old for this…”

The goat man had gone away. It took some time for Barry to find him again, scrutinising the egg. Manipulating the spell forms to see inside. Gaping. “An abomination did this?”

“An abomination that bonded with a force of divinity we call the Light of Creation,” explained Barry. “I was looking at the complications surrounding this subject, and it appears that the Light diverted the Abomination’s need to consume with its own -I guess-  _ need _ to replace or repair anything missing from this planar system. In this case - Elves.”

“These ones are clearly Dark Elves,” said the goat man.

“I’m not certain, yet,” said Barry, “but I think that the Light used only partial DNA from the twins to pattern the eggs’ content on what was missing. They say Sun Elves were the first Elves, but… every Elf subgroup says that about their own group.” He shrugged. “Uh. Hi. They call me Barry Bluejeans.”

“Vincent,” said Vincent, shaking Barry’s hand. “You have to understand, there are lots of bad stories about Elves. In both this plane and my own.”

“Stories are only echoes of the truth,” said Barry. “Besides, no matter what the stories say, these are infants. They won’t be doing anything  _ like _ the stories if their surrogate parentals raise them to avoid that sort of thing.”

Vincent goggled at him. “Knowing what we know about Elves? Would you raise some?”

“They’re innocents,” said Barry. “Of course I would.” After a moment’s thought, he added, “I mean, if I knew I could. We’ve tried to take people with us when the year ends? They don’t… stay with us… on the reset.”

“Convenient,” said Vincent.

“I seriously would,” said Barry. “Kids need good parents. Loving parents. I might make a lot of mistakes, but I’d give it my try.”

Vincent was rolling a bluff check. “There’s very few who could be like that. On Earth or in Silvain.”

“We need to find as many as we can,” said Barry. “These eggs are maturing way faster than they should. And if I can undo the youth spell on the beast’s victims, I might be able to fix that, but…”

Vincent was already examining the spell forms. “The beast wasn’t eating all the time,” he said. “It’s feeding the eggs. If you could find the first victim, we could unriddle this mage-work a lot faster.”

Barry’s heart fell into a black hole. “It was the twins. The beast attacked the twins first.” No. No, no, no, no, no… not the twins. They were the crewmembers who were nearest and dearest to his heart. It broke his heart to think of experimenting on them.

“You… you love these Elves?” asked Vincent in quiet astonishment.

Barry blushed. “I’ve always known them as adults, you understand. Now that they’re kids it’s not… you know… creepy or anything. They’re both… they’re both my best friends, you know? Just the thought of hurting them… hurts me.”

Vincent was clearly re-evaluating him. Barry could feel Vincent’s slot-eyed gaze weighing him in the balance. “We will analyse… thoroughly. Before we initiate the counter-work.”

Barry felt like he could breathe again. “Thank you.” And then his stomach roared like an angry tiger.

“After a meal?” suggested Vincent.

Almost on cue, the twins appeared with platters and cups. Both walking carefully as they did so.

“Magnus says you don’t know how to eat,” said one of them. Their right eye was green. Lup. Or Lulu in her reduced state. “It’s time for dove spoons, humanman.”

“Dove spoons and deliciousness,” added the other. Taako. Or was it Koko?

Barry obediently sat in a lower chair that Lulu pointed to. “You know, there are some Elven traditions that could easily be overlooked in your world. Elves could--” he paused because Lulu had cooed for him, and then he had to chew his mouthful. “--not do that thing where they have a child name and an adult name. The only drawback is--” Lulu cooed again. “--all of these kids are going to lose their adoptive parents tragically early.”

Vincent was actively trying not to boggle at the sight of a grown-ass man being spoon-fed by a small child.

Barry thanked Lulu and snagged his food off of her. “I know. It’s weird,” spoonful. “I get so caught up in theoretical mageform mathematics that I forget basic self-maintenance.”

“He’s too smart to know when he’s hungry,” said Koko, who got up in his space to sniff. “Or remember to bathe.”

“Gross,” said Lulu. “You finish that food and go take a shower, humanman.”

“Yes’m,” Barry smiled. The blush had overtaken his entire body, by now.

Koko turned to Vincent. “You’ve had a breakfast, right?”

“Of course,” said Vincent.

“Finally,” sighed Koko. “Someone on this crazy boat with some  _ sense.” _

 


	29. Chapter 29

It was later. The forces of magic and science reconvened in one room, with Aubrey as a student and Doctor Bonkers as the peanut gallery. The twins sat, clinging to each other, on the central table as Barclay, Barry, Dani and Davenport all worked with Vincent on the spell forms.

Which the twins were watching with growing trepidation.

Lulu was just scared, not understanding why they were the focus of such intense scrutiny, just watching the arcane symbols float through the air around them with fearful eyes.

For Koko, it was worse. Flickers of the adult Taako would surface, periodically, and he’d rush to get a concept out before it sank out of his reach.

Aubrey could tell that these red-robed aliens were clever folks. Her closest analogue would be if a bunch of astronauts found themselves in a pre-industrial world and had to repair their ship to get back. Or that primitive technology guy who, as a modern person, went into the scrub and showed how people made things in the stone age.

This was magic beyond anything that Aubrey could comprehend. She was taking her baby steps into actual real magic and, thanks to lessons from Dani and books from Silvain and a  _ lot _ of practice in an old stone quarry five miles from Kepler, so that she didn’t make Duck’s day job any more trouble than it had to be. She still had a lot of trouble with anything that veered off her usual magic show routines. Untying her magics from her stage patter was a continuing problem.

As was the fact that she could only pull magic crap with fire. Igniting it. Extinguishing it. Making ball lightning and making it obey her.

She had only tried commanding lightning once, and that had been an experience so terrifying that she never wanted to do it again.

She could, however, track certain symbols she knew, like the trans symbol orbiting the ring of spell symbols around Lulu’s head. Koko had interlinked male symbols, which meant that his adult self was gay. Considering how bold they were? He was super-gay.

It took her a while, but she could spot two distinct symbols in the twins’ magical auras. “Those ones are unique,” she said, pointing to the one orbiting Koko. And then the one orbiting Lulu.

“That’s the arcanic form of their names,” said Barry. “If you can find one of those symbols in the unified spellwork, then we’d know who was taken first.”

“I’m guessing the deer doesn’t count,” said Aubrey. She shifted her gaze to the orbiting circle of symbols around the three eggs that were now in the lab. She could, if she wanted to, peek inside and see how the infant Elves (all twins!) were faring. The oldest of them seemed to be five to six months along, but she  _ knew _ that the Beast hadn’t even been around for an entire month. Something hinky had to be going on.

Unriddling the hinkiness was part of her job.

She watched the symbols as they passed close. Identifying them as they cycled past. That one was the symbol for time. That one was for making. That was… “I found Koko’s sigil,” she called. And found it orbiting all three eggs. And the circle orbiting both huddling twins.

Barry looked absolutely devastated. “Of course it got Taako first,” he whispered, tears overflowing from his eyes. “He’d do anything to protect his sister.”

“So what happens now?” asked Koko.

Vincent changed the analysis spells, centring them on Koko. “Now,” he said, “we look deeper.”

The twins whimpered and tightened into a closer huddle. Koko was shivering.

These kids were scared out of their minds.

Aubrey reached over to pet Koko’s hair. It was like touching a cloud. “It’s okay,” she soothed. “It’s gonna be okay. Everyone’s just working out what’s gone wrong. And then they’ll figure out how to fix it.” She only stopped because Koko was flinching at every touch.

So she left, and went to the people who didn’t have much to do. “Hey,” she said to Magnus, who was the least magical of the bunch. “What’s a guaranteed morale booster for a couple of frightened baby Elves? ‘Cause those kids in there are fucking terrified.”

Magnus, who had been in the middle of colouring with baby Merle (Aubrey had bought them a packet of A4 and a huge assortment of crayons), straightened up and thought about this. “There’s a pick-’em-ups section in the Don’t Screw This Up cookbook,” he allowed. “We could look it up. Luce? Keep an eye on Trouble, down here?”

They changed the guard. Apparently, baby Merle was an unsupervised runner. Meaning the kid would take the first opportunity to run and find out, whether or not it was safe to. Hence the kiddie fence on the gangplank. And others of its ilk in other places. Like the engine room. Or the kitchen into which they were headed.

The aforementioned cookbook had a stronger word on the cover, and illuminated text that mentioned several crew by name. And called them out on their flaws.

Aubrey saw Barry’s name in there a lot. Like a real lot. Like… how did they regularly trust this man with a knife and fork? Barry was increasingly sounding like the kind of genius who had to have people around him to check that his clothes were on the right way around.

There was a section on comfort foods and the things that raised everyone’s spirits, with illustrated ingredients and the things that made these comforts best for each individual crewmember. “Who wrote this?” Aubrey asked. “They have to care for all of you so much.”

“More like, cares for his kitchen. Taako wrote it. Well. Dictated it. Lucretia put it all down and formalised everything. And made it look super nice.”

“But… there’s a section here for Taako…”

“Yup,” agreed Magnus, he looked up the oldest favourite. Something that required a lot of honey. And butter.

Aubrey helped, giggling at what had to be the very Taako notes to his fellow crew. Things like,  _ Lup, I know you want to flash-fry everything, but trust me. This recipe requires something you don’t have in abundance - patience. _ Or,  _ Barold, I swear to God, set a fucking timer and carry it with you. And write a fucking note. This is important. You can’t forget these and hope for the best. _ And,  _ Magnus, do not over-whip. Luce has illustrated what ‘stiff peaks’ mean. Multiple times. Fuck this up and I will rise from my death bed to extract a pound of your ass, roast it, and serve it to you on a bed of lettuce. _

Taako was, by inference, a very extreme perfectionist when it came to good food.

“Taako hates it when we waste supplies,” Magnus explained. “He and Lup kind’a… had to scrape by during their lives. Wasted food is like… a sin for them.”

The exact details were left up in the air, but Aubrey had met a few of that type. She’d even roomed with one. Personally, some of their habits were disgusting, like… living off the food that other people rejected. Or dumpster diving when they couldn’t afford books  _ and _ meals. Or consuming things past their expiry date.

On the other hand, they never went hungry and rarely had a problem. It worked for them. Aubrey had the luxury of not having to cut the spoiled parts away from her fruits and veg. He also had had the presence of mind not to ask that roomie how they sourced all of their surprisingly delicious food.

Taako was seemingly both gourmet and gourmand as the situation needed. And his twin sister wasn’t far behind.

It took them a while, but the eventually had a selection of fortifying foods and beverages for the twins, which they carefully carried back to the map room where the rest of both crews were working.

The twins both shot up from their huddle at the smell, and Koko’s frizzy hair morphed in and out of gorgeous-looking waves as they sat up.

“Thought you might need a little somethin’-somethin’,” said Aubrey. “Keep the spirits up, so to speak.”

They almost lunged for the stuff, but it was Koko who held them back. “Lulu, uh-uh.”

“But she’s  _ nice,” _ objected Lulu. “And the food’s right there.”

“What’s the catch?” demanded Koko. “What do we gotta do for this?”

“You’re already doing it,” said Aubrey. “You’re putting up with all this,” she gestured at the floating symbols and the people in weird gear doing strange and frightening things. “And it’s high time you two got a little reward, you know? Something to help you… not… be scared?”

“That started so well,” said Doctor Bonkers.

Aubrey vented a noise of exasperation. “Is it so weird that I wanna help you two?” she asked.

“Yes,” said Koko.

“Nobody likes us,” said Lulu.

“Not really,” added Koko. “Well. Except for our family and they’re not here.”

Aubrey could see Barry wince as if he felt extreme pain. “Well. Just so you know, people are allowed to be kind to kids. So all of this is no strings attached.” She put her tray within their easy reach and let them decide.

Magnus put his tray down in the same way. “Do I gotta do dove spoons?”

Aubrey snorted. They came from a world without airplanes. It had to be some kind of bird flying into its nest instead of the airplane coming in for a landing.

That snort was enough to tip the kids over the edge. They knew how to eat, that was for sure, and fell on their favourites like they hadn’t been fed in weeks.

Aubrey was prepared with a washcloth for when they were done, but let them get themselves good and messy before she descended. There was, after all, no point in doing spot cleans when the spots were still being made.

“Feeling a bit better?” she asked, already mopping up the sticky stains on their faces and hands.

Koko was more grudging in his acceptance of this small truth. More guarded about anything. Of course he was. According to Lucretia, these kids had had the shittiest of childhoods. Koko could remember flashes of his life. Lulu couldn’t. It was natural, then, that Koko would guard Lulu from an inevitability that she couldn’t recall.

Pushing for acceptance was the last thing that either of the twins needed, so Aubrey backed off. “If you need anything, you just let us know, okay?”


	30. Chapter 30

There were copies of a weird magazine in the lobby. Neddy, always on the lookout for something new, took one to have a look. It was full of stuff that his father would not have approved of. Aliens and Bigfoot and Buck Rogers stuff and things like the Loch Ness Monster.

They were called 'cryptids’, in this magazine. And not one of them took a good photo. But, given the very good artists impressions, Neddy could see the blurs a lot better as the things the articles said they were.

He even read one with real photos out to all the kids staying at the Amnesty Lodge. The one about ancient wood spirits who had turned up in Monongahela. Pugwanchinah.

The photo was a good one. A human-like figure who couldn’t possibly be human. With golden hair and slit pupils like a cat’s, and skin that was dappled like a fawn’s fur.

Staring at the photo, Neddy remembered glowing eyes in the dark. And felt like he was falling off a cliff. It was familiar. But not too familiar. But not too not familiar.

It made him dizzy and he felt weird.

But everyone there agreed that the story was cool.

_ And without knowing it, Li’l Neddy sowed the seeds of his own future profits… _

He let the other kids take turns at reading some of the more lurid portions of the Lamplighter Magazine. He had to go outside for fresh air. All of that stuff was making him so dizzy that he wanted to hurl.

Good thing that this lodge had a decent playground.

* * *

 

The spell ate time, that was true, and funnelled it into the eggs. Days bled slowly into the eggs, and fed and fueled the occupants. What they needed was something old to transfer the vampiric spell onto. Barry was still trying to figure out if it needed to be something  _ alive _ . He complained that the spell forms were difficult to unriddle, and half of what he’d gleaned was guesswork.

Vincent had left to get some arcanist experts from Sylvain. The world on the other side of the Gate. And as a direct result, the twins were free to relax and enjoy themselves.

Which meant that they were bugging the stuffing out of Duck.

He was hiding out from his work, and staying out of view by staying on the Starblaster because he was fifteen years younger than he ought to be.

Duck tolerated the twins and didn’t even try to use the voice of authority on them.

“That there’s my walkie-talkie,” he said, gently plucking it from curious fingers. “I need that for work.”

“You spoke to other voices,” said Lulu.

“You were looking for fires,” added Koko. “Did you know it was us?”

“Fire safety is very important inside of national parks,” he said. “We also get more’n our fair share of people who wanna drop off’a the grid and live on nature’s bounty. That’s not only illegal, but hazardous to the ecology of the park.”

“We were hungry,” protested Lulu.

“Humanman food makes our heads go wrong,” added Koko.

Duck nodded in understanding. “Yeah. And I have no doubt that the two of you would cause a stir if y’all tried to go through official channels. I’m willin’ to call it extenuating circumstances.”

Koko grinned at Lulu. “A lawman willing to bend the law. I’m liking this.”

Lulu had found the interior of the fanny pack. “Cool! A Bag of Necessity.”

“That there is registered,” said Duck. “You shouldn’t be able to get anything out of there that you ain’t entitled t--”

“WHOAH! Cool sword, dude.”

“Technically speaking, I am a whipsword,” said Beacon. “How did these neophytes lay their hands on my hilt, DucK?”

“I honestly have no idea.”

“What kind’a sword even is this?” laughed Koko, wobbling the bending blade around by its tip.

Beacon conspired to look pissed off, quite a feat considering that its range of expression was limited to one eyeball and one mouth. “You are not my destined wielders. I am the lightbringer, I am the beacon that defeats the darkness, I am the one true weapon of the destined hero.”

“You are full’a hot air,” dismissed Lulu, who crammed it back into the Fanny Pack of Necessity. “What else you got in there?”

“I’d appreciate it if you two didn’t go rummaging around in my equipment, thank you,” said Duck the Unflappable, moving the bag closer to his hip than his crotch.

Koko found the pen in Duck’s pocket, and since it was a clicker pen, was busy ejecting and retracting the nib. “Why does this thing have like a dog’s dick?”

Duck started to blush. “That’s a ballpoint pen. Some people think that sheltering the ball point makes it last longer.” He delicately plucked it out of Koko’s hands. “I need that for some of my duties, thank you.”

Lulu had discovered how to extract whatever she wanted out of the Fanny Pack of Necessity. “Dude! Infinite honeycombs!”

“No way,” said Koko, suitably distracted.

Baby Merle apparently heard the magic words and joined Lulu in extracting chunks of honeycomb bigger than Magnus’ fist. “Honeycombs? Gimmie!”

“I advise you restrain yourselves,” said Duck. “There is no way that this is going to end well for either of you.”

And, like everything else he had said to date, the twins ignored him.

* * *

 

It was later. Stickiness had happened.

There were three semi-comatose children sprawled across the floor of the rec room, now featuring an added W and K care of the torn and folded and drawn-on paper all over the place. Wads of honeycomb wax were stuck in weird places. Lots of it had got into the kids’ hair.

There was no sign of adult supervision and the twins had skinned down to their underwear.

“Oooowwwww…” one moaned.

“Shuddup,” whined the other.

“...my tummy hurts,” whimpered baby Merle.

There was a fanny pack half-concealed in the couch and a fist-sized wax snowman perched on one of the couch arms.

And someone had locked themselves in the Starblaster’s bathroom.

Lucretia, surveying the mess, deduced that whomever should have been doing babysitting duty had abandoned their post. And since Magnus was out with some local money and engaging in commerce…

She knocked on the bathroom door. “Come out of there, you coward.”

“Look at the ceiling and tell me that again,” said Duck’s voice.

Lucretia looked up. As well as the sticky, honey handprints on the wall and the crafted wax miniatures stuck in random places, there were tiny, dirty handprints on surfaces where ordinary children could not reach.

Elven handprints. Dwarven handprints. And one print that Lucretia certainly hoped was an artwork from one of the three youthified crew, because if it wasn’t…

Lucretia knocked on the door again. “Can I come and hide in there with you?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Past is Another Country: Once upon a time, science fiction was decried as, "that Buck Rogers stuff" by anyone who didn't have the mental capacity to get into it. Mainly because Buck Rogers was the one pulp character that entered the mainstream.
> 
> Sci-Fi has a phenomenal bad rep through the ages. It's been sneered at by the mainstream throng since its invention. Hell, pulps were once blamed for juvenile delinquency. Several times, actually. Between novels and jazz, and between jazz and comic books. Even now that it's achieving mainstream levels of acceptance, it's still seen as weird and something to be reviled. Maybe that's because a girl invented it. [Better not tell them about novels, author attribution, heroes with secret identities, storytelling at all, and probably the very concept of writing itself]


	31. Chapter 31

It took a couple of months, even with the Light as inspiration. A couple of months in which Barry and Lucretia together short-circuited the Abomination Hunt by laying some magical traps by the Gate. A couple of months in which things settled, more or less, to a routine.

A couple of months in which the missing adults and the found children were under the care of officials and volunteers alike as investigations continued.

Duck, still allegedly laid low by something, kept tabs on whose family was worried and whose didn’t seem to be bothered. In fact, he kept files. There were some who were better off knowing who was on their side and he knew it. He was going to make sure  _ they _ knew it, too.

If he had anything to say about things, people would leave Kepler with a better perspective on their lives to date.

Barry and Davenport came up for air, both looked devastated. Vincent, Barclay, and Dani followed. All were looking grim.

Duck started to feel grateful that the kiddiefied versions of the Starblaster crew were fast asleep in their beds. “This don’t look like a eureka moment.”

“No, we got it,” sighed Vincent. “It’s just…”

“Risky,” said Barry. “I can move the spell onto anything old. The older, the better.”

“But,” said Dani, “It could release all the time at once. People snapping back like elastic.”

“Or breaking,” added Davenport. “Not just the original victim. All of the victims…”

Duck shuddered, picturing everyone who had been youthified, snapping back to their original age in instants. Or decaying into dust from old age and worse. He might not be as effected, but that was a small comfort, considering all the other lives at stake.

And, much though he had a natural antipathy towards Ned’s horseshit, he didn’t think the grown man nor his childish self deserved the  _ Last Crusade _ treatment.

So he had to try and think things through.

“Now I understand that the Beast was eating time. Was it using all of it to -uh- reproduce? I guess?”

“Replicate,” said Barry. “Uh. No. It used a portion of that energy to sustain itself, the rest went into the -uh- eggs. When that portion of the spell snapped, the energy went back into the siphon pool to…” he trailed off. Started sketching figures in the air. “Holy fuck.” More figures. “If I can regulate the chroniton flow… set limits…” He picked up his Captain. “We can allot a growth term to within two years! We can feed them like it’s feeding the eggs! A siphon with a ‘when full’ term! Amazing! I-I-I-I-I-I-I need to make some notes.”

It was telling that Davenport knew how to land when Barry simply dropped him and left so fast that there was a brief, Barry-shaped cloud of dust left in his wake.

“I know I don’t have much in the way of authority over some of you,” said Davenport, “but I strongly advise that you all get some sleep. Burnsides, get the big coffee cup on for Hallwinter. Clarke? Nutritional muffins according to instructions. Go.”

“Aye aye!”

He faced the Pine Guard. “We have seven beds, one of which is taken up by the kids. If you wish to share with my crew, I have it on good authority that Burnsides is an excellent hugger.”

Dani blushed. “Naw, I’m gonna skip treetops back to the lodge. There’s an excellent hugger there I’d rather share my time with.”

“You go, girl,” muttered Barclay.

“Hallwinter will likely be sleeping on the floor again,” noted Davenport. “And he’s chaste about bed-sharing if he makes it back to his quarters.”

Duck put his hand up. “I’m there,” he said.

“Mr Tierni, do you have any preferences?”

“I gotta get back to my kitchen, I’ll be fine.”

Davenport nodded. “Pass the good news on to Mama. This whole mess may all be unriddled soon.”

Barclay saluted before he left.

Vincent remained, “I’ll take any spare bunk available, thank you.”

“Thank  _ you _ for trusting us,” said Davenport. Then stretched and sighed. “Good news for you - the sample we got off the last abomination is giving us some results. We’ll know all of it once we’re over this current crisis.”

Vincent followed suit. “My life is a current crisis, Captain.”

“Understood,” said Davenport. “Definitely after this one and before the end of the world.”

They all retreated to bed. Except for Barry, of course, off in another reality because he was, to quote Lulu, “too smart to look after himself properly.”

Duck knew the type. He was almost the type. Twenty-some years of running from his destiny had taught him more than a few survival skills. Including how to be invisible in plain sight.

In sneakers, jeans, and a hoodie, he was another young hipster looking for whatever was unique and special in Kepler. Especially now that he’d grown out some pathetic facial hair, and judiciously trimmed it in a hipster style.

He crept off the Starblaster and went to one of the Organic stories in Kepler. People who went there wouldn’t know him from Adam, and wouldn’t recognise the youthified District Ranger Duck Newton. Especially since Duck usually lived in his uniform.

Once there, he asked a few of the usual Hipster Asshole questions and eventually bought a whole bunch of supplies and a granny cart to haul it all back in. Anything to help preserve the natural balance of the Monongahela forest.

He always woke up early. And this time, when he did, he’d make these nice people a decent breakfast. Taako may believe that these folks could survive on muffins and pancakes, but they needed some decent nutrition.

He couldn’t do a lot, this time around. But he could do this.


	32. Chapter 32

Arcane sigils were dancing in circles to a tune he couldn’t immediately recall, but was guaranteed to keep in his head forever.

_ Chooka chooka hoo la ley (That's what they sang) Looka looka koo la ley/ Wondrous is our great blue ship/ That sails around the mighty sun/ And joy to everyone that rides along! _

“Boop,” someone poked his nose.

Barry almost hit his face on the desk.

Koko shoved a plate under his nose as Lucretia scooted his working out of the way. “The blue-haired humanman cooked,” he said. “Needs more garlic.”

“Needs more hot sauce,” said Lulu in argument. She scooped up a forkful and made a dovelike coo.

Barry obediently opened his mouth for it, and took over the eating utensil. “I’m okay,” he reassured. “Thank you.”

“Looks like it was a breakthrough,” said Koko. “Got any good news, Barold?”

“His name’s Sildar Hallwinter,” corrected Lulu. “Why’d you keep calling him ‘Barold’?”

Koko sighed. “It’s an in-joke from when we were older. Keep up, Lulu. There’s magic shit.”

“I don’t remember any magic shit,” and since Barry was being too slow for her liking, she helped him spear some vegetables and guided it to his mouth with another dove coo.

“Of course you don’t, your memory’s been messed with.”

Lulu rolled her disbelieving eyes. Put on a condescending air. “Koko likes to pretend he’s older, sometimes. Humour him.”

Barry laughed, even as he regained his control of the fork. “I’m good with this. Is there any of that coffee left?”

“We’re making a fresh batch,” said Lucretia, perpetually into her notes.

“I’m’a need my undertow mug and a criminal amount of honey when it’s ready. Thanks.”

“Almond milk?”

“Just a smidge,” he answered. He knew it was a sure sign to those who knew him that he was desperately tired.

Lucretia whistled backwards. “You know our Captain’s going to order you to rest up for a week after this.”

“Worth it,” said Barry.

Lulu’s hand was on his fork-holding hand. She cleared her throat in a meaningful way.

“I’m eating, I’m eating,” he said, gathering more to eat. “See? I’m being a good humanman.”

Lulu grinned, settling herself next to him. “You’re funny. I like you.”

Almost word for word what she’d said to him the moment he’d realised that she was a twin, and promptly had a mental meltdown.

To think, he had once been so terrified of their beauty that he couldn’t string one sentence together around them. It had taken him years to learn that they were the furthest from the ethereal, judgemental, and higher and mightier stereotype of Elven kind that any being could get and still be an Elf.

They were still like that.

He mumbled, “Thank you,” and focussed on his food. Coffee appeared and the twins vanished to whichever corners and trouble they could find. Coffee and copious amounts of it forced his brain and body into consciousness. He would pay for it later but, as he said, it was worth it.

Not just for the twins. Not just for Merle. But also for all the natives of this plane who would never know who they were or what they’d done. Every world saved was a positive score in his book. Every single one that escaped the Hunger was worth every sacrifice.

He found a spare piece of paper and jotted down his dream. His subconscious was telling him something. He could feel it.

He was so  _ close. _


	33. Chapter 33

The red-robed man who turned up in the strategy room looked way older than forty-something. He hadn’t bathed. He hadn’t groomed, and he held a sheaf of paper like it was a mighty weapon.

Mama barely recognised him as Barry from the Starblaster. Not that she’d seen very much of him aside from the moments that he stumbled, zombie-like, into the Starblaster kitchen for more coffee. Or the moments when his fellow crew sat him down for real food and Lulu spoon-fed him whatever he wasn’t paying enough attention to.

“I’ve got it,” he crowed.

“I hope it ain’t infectious,” said Mama. “You look ‘bout ready to keel on over.”

“Thank you,” he said, and lurched over to the strategy table. Put his papers down and smoothed them. “This is the unriddle. It’s gonna do it. Plus or minus two years. Tops.”

“Plus  _ or _ minus?” echoed Mama.

He looked her in the vicinity of her eyes. “It’s the closest I can get. We can probably sell it as the after-effects of some spring. You have a story of the fountain of youth, right?”

“Yeah, but it’s s’pose’da be in Florida.”

Barry let fly a manic giggle. “Maybe that’s where they thought it was. Pick an inaccessible spring. Stir in -what was it? Pug wanna china?”

“Pugwanchinah,” corrected Barclay.

“Yeah that. And add whatever is the most plausible at the time and nobody should ask too many questions. I hope.” He took a moment to steady himself. “What I need is something really… really old. For the siphon transfer. Doesn’t matter if it’s inorganic. Just… something old as balls.”

“But it already got Neddy,” said Aubrey.

“Hardy har har,” deadpanned Barclay. “We can’t use the Gate. That’s way too much arcane power. How ‘bout a mountain? They have to be old as balls.”

Dani ran his finger over the map. “How about… an ancient volcanic core?”

Smiles slowly spread all around the table.

“Oooh,” said Barry. “Volcano gun. Lup’d fucking  _ love _ it.”

Aubrey said, “Is there a way to make sure it’d be useful during the fight with your Hunger?”

“Well,” he sighed, “If we get Lup back, she’d definitely be able to use it. And that curse of Duck’s… if we can get him to aim that… I bet that storm won’t like a bunch of lava shooting at it. I know it hates fire.”

“I can do fire,” said Aubrey.

“I’ve seen,” he said. “Pretty good considering there’s no schools of magic around here. Lup will teach you everything you need to know. If… I’m almost certain I can get her back. Get them all back.” He wavered in his position. He looked like he was ready to collapse.

“I think you should rest up before you try this,” said Barclay.

“I think he should rest up before he up and dies,” added Mama.

“...can’t ‘ford t’ do that,” Barry sighed. Then he slumped. Then he collapsed.

Barclay saved him from knocking himself on the head on the way down. He carried Barry to one of the empty suites and initiated all of the steps to make sure that Barry wouldn’t wake up until he was good and ready to wake up. Closed curtains and blinds, a restful temperature on the climate control, a very specific white noise that would obliterate any outside noise whilst also providing a soporific effect. And, just to be certain, a  _ Do Not Disturb _ sign on the door.

“Awright,” sighed Mama. “He’s gonna be a while. Dani? You get word to his friends. Ain’t nothin’ more happening tonight, so let’s all get some rest. I get the feelin’ we’re all gonna be workin’ our butts off real soon.” She got out a paper map of Monongahela, and circled the spot that Dani had identified. Their plans would take them there.

But not before their alleged genius got himself rested and fed up.


	34. Chapter 34

They had to fly there in the Starblaster. Otherwise, it would have been two weeks of arduous hiking, and none of the youthified crew were prepared for that sort of thing. Neither were the Pine Guard, to be honest.

Barry ran them through the plan again. “Duck, the first thing we need to do is use Beacon to etch Taako’s arcane symbol into the oldest surface of the volcanic core.”

“Need I remind everyone present that I am, in fact, a weapon of legend and not, as you desire, a common chisel?” Beacon objected. “DucK, you are my destined wielder, you cannot permit this gross misuse of my abilities.”

“I can and I will,” said Duck. “Unless you want to go looking for a legendary magic chisel.”

“I would not sully myself with its acquaintance, nor would I permit you, my destined wielder, to soil your hands with such an ignominious  _ tool, _ DucK.”

“Well, then, that’s settled. You’re makin’ the mark.”

Barry snorted, but didn’t say anything out loud about the debate. He cleared his throat and continued. “After that’s done, we’ll need Taako -er- Koko  _ on _ the sigil so I can make the transfer easier. And when I add a revivification spell to the stone, it will be alive enough to fool the spell-form into believing that Koko and the rock are the same entity.”

“Just how stupid is magic like this?” wondered Aubrey.

“I wouldn’t underestimate the spellform,” said Doctor Bonkers. “It is very complicated and involved, considering that it was formed in the merging of two entities that were never meant to mingle.”

“The good news,” said Barry, “is that I can give the granite some basic programming to protect the planet it’s born from. That’ll definitely spread into the -uh- ‘flesh’ of the mountain as it gradually grows back.”

“The mountain’s going to grow  _ back?” _ echoed Vincent.

“It is a time reversal spell. We can add a Seeming so that regular people don’t notice. I’ve studied them, they should be easy. As for the cutoff phrase, I can insert that into a section of the extant code, meaning that when the eggs hatch, the babies will continue to grow at an accelerated rate. Sustained by the spell until they reach a certain level of maturity.”

“What level are we talking, here?” demanded Lucretia.

“Well… teenagers are naturally hostile and we’re going to need all the magic we can get to fend off the hunger, sooo.... About forty or so?”

“How… the fuck… are either of our worlds going to raise a whole fuckbunch of angry teenage-equivalent Elves?” demanded Barclay.

“Uh,” said Barry. “How are your foster systems?”

“Atrocious,” said Aubrey.

“There’s plenty of industries that would need apprentices,” offered Vincent.

“Babies need love,” said Magnus. “Not jobs.”

Barry froze in place. “I don’t suppose the cliché of a couple so desperate for a child that they’d take in any kind of creature is… normal? In your realm?” he asked Vincent. “I mean it was pretty common in our home realm, but… you know… can’t depend on tropes everywhere, and--”

“There are plenty,” said Vincent. “They will love even an Elven child. Or… twins.”

“Good. ‘Cause I think giving them all a good reason to defend these worlds might be exactly what we need. And these eggs are gonna hatch pretty soon.”

Aubrey began sending an urgent text to Dani, since Mama distrusted any mobile phone capable of more than calling people. Good thing they had made ready with the adult-sized clothing that all the youthified citizens had left behind as children.

Dani sent a double thumb’s up emoji. “Everyone’s ready, back at the Lodge.”

“Awright,” said Mama. “Let’s do this.”


	35. Chapter 35

The entire mountain shivered when the halo of sigils lowered from around his head to the head of the granite where Duck had etched that one sign. And then he started to feel… really weird.

The world slowed down around him.

It became easier to recall all one hundred and forty-three years that he had actually lived. As well as the years on this seemingly eternal flight from the hunger.

Lulu looked real alarmed about his situation, but she was trapped in a second like a fly in amber. It was the first time in recent memory that her hair had curled involuntarily.

He wanted to reach out and comfort her, to tell her that it was going to be okay. Which was real hard to do when he was busy outgrowing the clothes he had had on at six. He winced as the seams popped and the fabric tore, and had to cover his junk from the surprised gaze of the natives.

He had few objections to being ogled, but starting a relationship this late in the game was not his idea of a fun time. Besides, it’d probably cause another crisis engine failure on the Starblaster. And he didn’t want to get chewed out for that kind of noise  _ again. _

Lulu was trying to scream. He could see her mouth open, but all he could hear was a deep, bass low, like some form of weird cow or trumpet.

She was starting to speed up, just a little, as his body stabilised and things evened out.

Still deep in the lower registers, he could make out his sister saying, “Koko, what’s happening?” but it was spaced out for a painfully long time.

He doubted she could understand it, even if he tried to tell her.

Mags got something out of his satchel. Ha. A red robe. One of Lucretia’s dress-like ones, since his arcanist’s uniform robes left little to the imagination in the groinal areas.

Taako decided to be grudgingly grateful for the cover.

But before that, and after his perception of time returned to its normal flow, he reached out to comfort his sister. “It’s gonna be okay, Lulu. Trust me.”

“When’d we get fat?” she asked, and then the spell hit.

Taako barely had time to get his loaner robe on and Luce’s other spare out before Lup was herself again.

“Holy shit, that was a wild ride,” she said. “My memories are fucked. The hell. Up.”

“Mine are pretty much slotting into place,” Taako preened. “Guess that makes me the superior twin, now.”

Lup didn’t rise to the bait. She put on a condescending grin and stage whispered to Barclay, “My baby brother has these delusions every now and again. Humour him.”

Taako could feel an ear flicking in annoyance. “At least I can remember my life _in order_.”

Aubrey was already ringing her girlfriend. “Hey babe. Need you to listen to some stuff. Hey. Lup? I need you to tell her how messed up this all is, straight away.”

Lup took the phone and let Aubrey assist her. “Hey? Hey! This is like a Stone of Farspeech. We have  _ got _ to get us some of  _ these.” _ She grinned. And then she began to explain.

* * *

 

Okay, babe, so the thing with these kid memories of mine is that I remember them in sequence with my real life? It just… slots in randomly.

Like, one time we were smooching up to some cook in a wagon, and then I’m dreaming about this nice lady with metal in her face who looked after us in a really posh place for a while.

One minute I’m in the middle of winter with Koko, and sheltering in some badger burrow and sharing body heat, and the next I’m staring at him as an adult on the top of a mountain. The half from this time seems like this weird dream, just… shuffled into everything I already knew.

It’s fucked up, I know, but the longer I think about it, the less I’m sure that these new memories don’t belong.

That useful for you?

Really, babe?

Glad you got some plausible deniability going on, then. Hey. Do me a favour and hook me up with some of this crazy tech stuff. Does it work everywhere?

Aw shit. Screw that, then. Kay, I gotta go check in with my crew. Luck, babe.

* * *

 

The twins spent a solid minute hugging. Breathing in sync and purring softly and erratically for each other.

When they broke, Taako said, “I dunno about you, but I could eat a bear.”

Lup grinned and joked, “Set you up with one on the next cycle.”

Both turned to Barclay, and said, “Don’t you own a pretty cool kitchen?”

Barry reeled as the realisation struck him square in the balls. “We’re gonna need to put on a feast,” he said. “Metabolic overload.”

The twins were way ahead of him, already on the Starblaster and starting with the quick stuff. Of  _ course _ growing back into an adult from a child body would have its strains. Of  _ course _ they’d need to replenish their resources. Of  _ course _ the current state of their bodies was ephemeral. Mass and energy didn’t come out of nowhere.

And they had to make it up  _ quick. _

Which lead to a rather urgent and literal flight straight to the Lodge, where a well-stocked kitchen and two near-identical master chefs made a blowout of a feast. One for pretty much all of the senses.

Barclay kept to simple tasks, lest he hurt himself because he was staring at the twins. Even with the Seeming on, they were an incredible sight. Two people moving as if they were telepathically connected, movements smoothly flowing with barely a word.

Even when Lup was stealing garlic away from Taako, and Taako was stealing hot sauce away from his sister. Their banter was lively, friendly, and peppered with cussing.

Even as adults, they were hard to tell apart. Identical haircuts. Both tied up in lazy ponytails because their minds were on filling their stomachs. Identical walks - or dancing, because the first thing they did was put some music on to turn the kitchen into a show. Identical ways of stirring. And the way they just… grooved around each other dazzled the eye and made it hard to tell who was whom.

But it came to him in patches. Taako was the one who always used the word ‘listen’ as a preface to most of the things he said. Lup was the one who overused the word ‘babe’ to the point where it was nearly meaningless. And she was the one who inevitably started the Forty-Five Minutes Argument.

“You should listen to your elders,” she would say, and then it would be off again.

The  _ other _ way to tell which one of the twins was Lup was by carefully watching Barry Bluejeans, and figuring out which twin he was watching with a dopey, dreamy smile on his face.

Dani barged in with a spare set of hospital-esque scrubs and a white coat. She was wearing the other set that the Lodge had stowed away for emergencies.

“I need someone with glasses who’s at home with technobabble. C’mon, Romeo. You’re going to be Doctor Payne, okay.” And she dragged him away.

Barry barely had time to say, “Bye, Lup,” before Barclay’s backup was gone for good.

Which was why he was focussing on the simple stuff that would not cause him to harm himself by accident.

The fact that the twins sampled a healthy portion of whatever on the way out was probably part of the greater plan. The same with them scraping the bain marie dishes clean and sharing the remaining contents as they came back. There were, after all, thirty people suffering the same metabolic overload as the twins.

All of whom were very confused, and filling up spaces in the Lodge dining hall. Followed by filling up spaces in their surprisingly empty stomachs. None of them ate the  _ total _ of their adult mass, but Barclay was starting to wonder if it wasn’t a close thing.

* * *

 

“Twenty-eight missing people have been located after a two-month long search. As it turns out, there was a wildcat virus carried by a rogue opossum wandering the Monongahela parklands,” said the newscaster. “According to official reports, the opossum spread the virus by contact and authorities could not risk a nationwide outbreak. Experts from a special branch of the CDC were able to contain the patients in a nearby ski lodge as they worked tirelessly on the cure.”

District Ranger Duck Newton appeared on the screen. His proper age, weight, and with freshly-dyed hair. “Once we realised that the rogue opossum was the vector, we had to act quickly to contain it, and the people it contacted before things got any worse. We had to maintain strict control on the news concerning the individuals, as we had no wish to cause a panic. The opossum in question was used to create a vaccine and the virus is now no longer a problem.”

The assembled press barked, “Mr Newton!” until Duck picked one out.

“What about the wandering children that were found in the park?”

“They were a lost tour group whose bus driver thought that their vehicle was all-terrain. All thirty children have been safely returned to their homes,” said Duck. “Though I would like to take this occasion as a chance to remind all park visitors to log their travel plans with Monongahela rangers. It’s not just for the paperwork. Thank you.”

Kirby turned off the news and turned to his boss. “So what actually happened, Ned?” He started recording. This was going to be a good one, he could tell.

“My friend, that is a long and convoluted story, and I only remember part of it. As it turns out, our little friends, Pugwanchinah, were actually aliens from another reality, who also had their time stolen by an extra-dimensional beast.…”


	36. Chapter 36

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Final instalment. I'm pondering adding a postscript chapter if y'all have unanswered questions.
> 
> And I apologise for any disapointment you may have about this.

Duck Newton didn’t care for the news. He didn’t care for the notice it got him. He didn’t much care for anything at all but the little patch of Earth called Monongahela. And this small abode he came home to.

Two more weeks, and they’d be hunting another Abomination. Or not. The IPRE team had an interesting trap spell they were still trying to teach Aubrey. Some of it might stick if they kept at it. And there was the lingering problem of what to do about the coming apocalypse.

Coming next midsummer, if he figured right.

“DUCK NEWTON!”

Of course she had to pop up now. “Minerva. Make it quick before your connection shorts out.”

“THE HOPE FOR ALL FUTURES LIES IN YOUR CURSE, DUCK NEWTON,” she said, “THE MOUNTAIN GROWS YOUNG AS THE PATCH FOR THESE WORLDS GROWS UP. YOU MU-- SE Y-- RSE.” And she was gone.

“Why does nobody ever say anything straight up?” he sighed, hanging Beacon on the wall opposite the TV.

“Perhaps the future is easier to comprehend as a puzzle, DucK.”

“Here’s the deal,” Duck said. “You shut up when I’m watchin’ my stories and I’ll let you pick a thing or three to watch during the day. Gotta be a million times better than a cupboard, right?”

The whipsword appeared to consider this. “I must admit, DucK, it will be interesting to see what has diverted your attention from your duties as the chosen one.”

Duck accepted this as a compromise and sat down to his microwave dinner. Flicked a few remotes and activated the tivo.

“The world is ending in less than a year,” said Beacon, “And you devote your time to observing some street of coronations?”

“Longest running soap in the world,” said Duck. “And I have me a liking for British television. By the way, this is where you shut your word hole.”

* * *

 

Things were not smooth and easy. Lup and Taako both had to transfer essential learning into the spell. Language. Co-ordination. Survival skills. True to his word, Vincent gave out the eggs to families who would love their strange, rapidly-growing Elven children, teaching them as best they could. Loving them as hard as they could.

The twins held classes that they insisted on calling Elf Practice, and nobody could make them stop it. Not necessarily training them for combat, but also training them for life. How to negotiate from a position of weakness. How to make do with whatever was to hand. How to make themselves even prettier, because a high charisma roll could literally save a life.

What they all knew, from the get-go, was how to depend on their twin.

Which was what made the last lesson the hardest.

“Lup and I have died a few times. Sometimes… apart. It’s…”

“Rough,” said Lup. “Because we reset with every world, it’s got easier for us, but you…”

“You only have this life. This world,” said Taako. “Love your twin as hard as you can, that’s great. That’s good.”

“But this is a war. Look around. All these beautiful Elves, and about a third of them can be wiped out. And don’t you dare think ‘not my sister’, or ‘not my brother'.”

“It can happen,” said Taako. “It will happen to some of you. But here’s the good news.”

Lup said it, “You all have something to fight for. Your families. Your twin. This world. They all need us.”

“We’re going to do what we can to make it easier for you,” said Taako, “but that’s not a guarantee that it will be easy.”

“This is the hardest thing you’re going to do. For all of your lives.”

“If you’re gonna go down, take some of it down with you. Make it pay and make it pay hard. Make it  _ scream. _ You’ve seen our memories. You know what it does.”

Lup grinned in spite of the grim atmosphere. “NOW WHO’S READY TO FUCK SHIT UP?”

Over one thousand angry fifty-something Elves let out a cheer.

And over on a mountain that was now getting even younger, Duck stood with his sword in one hand and a rope around his waist.

“This has got to be the stupidest darn thing I have ever done.”

“If it is stupid and it works, DucK, it must not be that stupid.”

Duck didn’t even bother to thank Beacon for his input. The other end of the rope was firmly tied to the railing of the Starblaster, still cloaked from mortal eyes. Not that they need have bothered, because the world was looking at the living black of the Hunger, alive with ribbons of green, blue, red, and yellow. Filling the sky.

He had both hands around Beacon’s hilt. Raised above his head.

“Minerva,” he said, “If you can hear me… a clear indicator of when to do this would be nice.”

And she appeared. Looking better than she ever had when he had denied his destiny. “NOW!”

He didn’t need to be told twice. He plunged the sword into the sigil, and said the worst word he knew.

 

There was light. 

 

And heat.

 

And a pulling at his waist that seemed about ready to cut him in half.

 

And then he was falling into the lake, swimming up into the clear air and watching a solid column of molten lava hit the Hunger square in the middle of one of its descending tendrils. The silver ship and her crew ducked under another one.

Miracle of miracles, the tendrils retreated. Around the location of the Gate, almost a thousand different spells soared upwards towards the hungering darkness. There were other magics happening in Silvane, he knew, because the young Elves who now belonged to this world were teaching their loved ones everything they could.

Duck made it to shore, and protected some innocent picnickers from some creatures that had emerged from a Hunger column.

Over on the Lodge’s dome, Aubrey was directing lightning at the sky. It didn’t matter what she hit, only that she couldn’t miss.

And maybe, one day, Duck would find out where the living heck Ned “fucking” Chicane had got his hands on that rocket launcher.

But that was a worry for another day.

What mattered now was the fight.

* * *

 

Another world. Another reset. Another chance to fuck up so badly and kill another reality through accident, neglect, or just a mistake.

Taako released his white-knuckle grip on his sister’s arm. “That was one of the good ones,” he said.

“Aside from the speciesism,” she jibed. “Barold? Babe? Hanging off the back of the ship with the Light in your arms has to be the stupidest and most reckless goddamn thing I’ve ever seen done yet.”

“W-well, uh. Des-desperate times, I guess?”

She grinned. “I liked it.”

Taako rolled his eyes. When were these two nerds going to wake up and realise that they loved each other? “I’m gonna go bake something,” he growled. Why, oh  _ why _ did both his sister and his best friend swear him to secrecy. Some cycles, he swore, they would all be better off if he just knocked their heads together and locked them in a closet until they figured it the fuck out.

 

END!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for sticking with me and reading this whole thing. My muse is a strange creature and takes me in weird directions. You can follow me on Tumblr @internutter or check out my hub site, internutter.org, for full details of what I'm up to at any given day.
> 
> It also has details on how to have YOUR say about the fic I work on next. The one I'm working on now is ALMOST finished, and should be appearing soon. It's the one I work on NEXT that's in your hands. Or in this case, opinion.
> 
> That site again: internutter.org


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